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What Makes Mars Unique

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Mars, also known as “The Red Planet”, is the fourth planet from the Sun in our solar system. It is much colder than Earth because it is far from the Sun and liquid water currently cannot exist. Mars is half of the diameter of Earth and it has the highest mountain and longest valley in the Solar System. What makes Mars unique is its giant mountain, Olympus Mons, and longest valley, Valles Marineris. Olympus Mons is the largest volcano that measures 370 miles in diameter. Valles Marineris’ system of valleys was named after the Mariner 9 probe that discovered it in 1971. Scientists think that Valles Marineris formed mostly by the rifting of the crust as it got stretched. Mars is known as “The Red Planet” because of its bloody color and during the ancient times it received various names like “Her Dhser”, by the Greeks and Romans and “The …show more content…

Siberia, Alaska and Antarctica resemble Mars because of the permafrost where substance where subsurface water-ice and small life form exist. In Death Valley, California, its Ubehebe crater and “Mars Hill” have geological features similar to those on Mars. In Mono Lake, California, there is a 700,000 year old evaporative lake that compares to Gusev Crater a basin on Mars where water once was likely. In Channeled Scabland, Washington, there was catastrophic floods that swept through the land much like what happened long ago in the Ares Valles flood plain where Mars Pathfinder Landed. Since 1997, the Haughton Mars Project has been conducting missions every summer. Located in Devon Island, Artic, Canada, it is an exploration and science research in an international, multidisciplinary field project. It has about 100 participants from different institutions and disciplines led by Dr. Pascal Lee, come from NASA Ames Research Center (ARC), Mars Institute and SETI

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