Diversity of new martian crater clusters informs meteoroid atmospheric interactions
OA Location
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
We investigated 634 crater clusters on Mars detected between 2007 and 2021, which represent more than half of all impacts discovered in this period. Crater clusters form when meteoroids in the 10 kg–10 ton mass range break up in Mars' atmosphere to produce a few to a few hundred fragments that hit the ground. The properties of the clusters can inform our understanding of meteoroid properties and the processes that govern their fragmentation. We mapped individual craters >1 m within each cluster and defined a range of cluster properties based on the spatial and size distributions of the craters. The large data set, with over eight times more cluster observations than previous work, provides a more robust statistical investigation of crater cluster parameters and their correlations. Trends in size, dispersion, and large crater fraction with elevation support weak atmospheric filtering of material. The diversity in the number of individual craters within a cluster, and their size-frequency distributions, may reflect either a diversity in fragmentation style, fragility, or internal particle sizes.
Date Issued
2023-04
Date Acceptance
2023-03-03
Citation
Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, 2023, 128 (4), pp.1-16
ISSN
2169-9097
Publisher
American Geophysical Union (AGU)
Start Page
1
End Page
16
Journal / Book Title
Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets
Volume
128
Issue
4
Copyright Statement
© 2023. The Authors.
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.
Sponsor
Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC)
Identifier
http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2022je007611
Grant Number
ST/T002026/1
Subjects
0201 Astronomical and Space Sciences
0402 Geochemistry
0403 Geology
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2023-03-09