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Remote Sensing
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Planetary Landscapes Analysis Based on Remote Sensing Images
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Planetary Landscapes Analysis Based on Remote Sensing Images

A special issue of Remote Sensing (ISSN 2072-4292). This special issue belongs to the section "Environmental Remote Sensing".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 May 2023) | Viewed by 10048

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Kirby Runyon

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
1. Planetary Geology & Exploration, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD 20723, USA
2. Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
Interests: planetary geology; geology; aeolian geology; impact cratering
Dr. Angela M. Dapremont

E-Mail Website1 Website2
Co-Guest Editor
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD 20723, USA
Interests: visible and near-infrared spectroscopy; surface composition; mud volcanism
Dr. Alexandra Matiella-Novak

E-Mail Website
Co-Guest Editor
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD 20723, USA
Interests: remote sensing of volcanic features

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In NASA’s mantra on the progression of planetary exploration, “Flyby, orbit, land, rove, return,” the first two—flyby and orbit—are the necessary first steps in determining the geology of a planet or small body from optical and infrared remote sensing. Initial reconnaissance missions such as Luna 3, Mariner IV, Pioneer Venus, Mariner 10, Voyager, New Horizons, and others used remote sensing to enable geoscientists to map and interpret the geology, geophysics, tectonics, and composition of planetary surfaces. Beyond first reconnaissance, continued optical and infrared mapping—such as from Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, Galileo, and Cassini—allow detailed scrutiny of geologic contexts and processes at a level of detail only rivaled by the relatively few landed planetary missions. Indeed, such remote sensing gives humanity the broadest geologic survey possible in the solar system and enables future surface geoscience exploration. Ultimately, such knowledge contextualizes Earth—which is a precious hand sample in the outcrop of the Solar System.

In this Special Issue of Remote Sensing, we invite you to share your expertise in using remote sensing to interpret the geology of planetary landscapes, whether from single-mission destinations such as Pluto, Charon, and Arrokoth, to the well- and repeatedly studied Mars. Contributions which use one planetary target to inform our understanding of another—the realm of comparative planetology—are especially encouraged, as are those that leverage analogous terrestrial geology.

Letter-length, long-form, and review articles are all appropriate. Examples of themes include but are not limited to geomorphology, geologic surface processes, tectonics, exploration, aeolian studies, geologic mapping, chronostratigraphy, and spectroscopy.

Dr. Kirby Runyon
Dr. Angela M. Dapremont
Dr. Alexandra Matiella-Novak
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Remote Sensing is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • comparative planetology
  • earth analogs
  • geomorphology
  • surface processes
  • tectonics
  • exploration
  • aeolian geology
  • mapping
  • chronostratigraphy
  • spectroscopy

Published Papers (5 papers)

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28 pages, 21481 KiB  
Article
Salt Constructs in Paleo-Lake Basins as High-Priority Astrobiology Targets
by Michael S. Phillips, Michael McInenly, Michael H. Hofmann, Nancy W. Hinman, Kimberley Warren-Rhodes, Edgard G. Rivera-Valentín and Nathalie A. Cabrol
Remote Sens. 2023, 15(2), 314; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs15020314 - 5 Jan 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1482
Abstract
In extreme environments, microbial organisms reside in pockets with locally habitable conditions. Micro-climates conducive to the persistence of life in an otherwise inhospitable environment—“refugia”—are spatially restricted and can be micro- to centimeters in extent. If martian microbes are preserved in fossil refugia, this [...] Read more.
In extreme environments, microbial organisms reside in pockets with locally habitable conditions. Micro-climates conducive to the persistence of life in an otherwise inhospitable environment—“refugia”—are spatially restricted and can be micro- to centimeters in extent. If martian microbes are preserved in fossil refugia, this presents a double-edged sword for biosignature exploration: these locations will be specific and targetable but small and difficult to find. To better understand what types of features could be refugia in martian salt-encrusted basins, we explore a case study of two terrestrial habitats in salt-encrusted paleo-lake basins (salars): Salar Grande (SG) in the Atacama Desert and Salar de Pajonales (SdP) in the Altiplano Puna plateau of Chile. We review the formation of salt constructs within SG and SdP, which are the features that serve as refugia in those salars, and we explore the connection between the formation of salt constructs at the local scale with the larger-scale geologic phenomena that enable their formation. Our evaluation of terrestrial salars informs an assessment of which chloride basins on Mars might have had a high potential to form life-hosting salt constructs and may preserve biosignatures, or even host extant life. Our survey of martian salars identifies 102 salars in regions with a geographic context conducive to the formation of salt constructs, of which 17 have HiRISE coverage. We investigate these 17 martian salars with HiRISE coverage and locate the presence of possible salt constructs in 16 of them. Salt constructs are features that have may have been continuously habitable for the past ~3.8 Byr, have exceptional preservation potential, and are accessible by robotic exploration. Future work could explore in detail the mechanisms involved in the formation of the topographic features we identified in salt-encrusted basins on Mars to test the hypothesis that they are salt constructs. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Planetary Landscapes Analysis Based on Remote Sensing Images)
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11 pages, 6278 KiB  
Article
An Effusive Lunar Dome Near Fracastorius Crater: Spectral and Morphometric Properties
by Caitlin Ahrens and Raffaello Lena
Remote Sens. 2022, 14(23), 6135; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14236135 - 3 Dec 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1926
Abstract
We examine a dome within the boundary between Fracastorius crater and Mare Nectaris. The dome has a noticeable vent structure and appears to be perpendicular to wrinkle ridges in the southern Mare Nectaris basin. The spectral signature of this dome, derived from Clementine [...] Read more.
We examine a dome within the boundary between Fracastorius crater and Mare Nectaris. The dome has a noticeable vent structure and appears to be perpendicular to wrinkle ridges in the southern Mare Nectaris basin. The spectral signature of this dome, derived from Clementine UVVIS and Chandrayaan-1 M3 reflectance data, revealed that Fracastorius has low TiO2 content and primarily basaltic material. Using altimeter data, we measured the dome diameter to be 28.6 km, with a dome height of 241.5 m, and a flank slope of 1°. Based on rheological modeling of the dome and a viscoelastic model of the presumed feeder dike, we obtained a magma viscosity of 3.1 × 105 Pa s, an effusion rate of 5.9 m3 s−1, a duration of multiple effusion processes of 4.15 years, and a magma rise speed of 2.1 × 10−4 m s−1. From these measurements, we estimate the feeder dike geometry to have a horizontal dike length of 234 km and a width of 11.8 m. A comparison of the Fracastorius dome with other noted lunar domes with similar morphometric properties reveal similar magma viscosities to domes found near craters Mee, Milichius and Petavius. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Planetary Landscapes Analysis Based on Remote Sensing Images)
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15 pages, 2043 KiB  
Article
Tectonism of Late Noachian Mars: Surface Signatures from the Southern Highlands
by Trishit Ruj, Goro Komatsu, Gene Schmidt, Suniti Karunatillake and Kenji Kawai
Remote Sens. 2022, 14(22), 5664; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14225664 - 9 Nov 2022
Viewed by 1851
Abstract
Upwelling mantle plumes often instigate extensional stress within the continental crust of Earth. When stress exceeds crustal strength, extensional structures develop, reducing the effective stress and trigger magmatic processes at the crust–mantle boundary. However, such processes and their relationship to the formation of [...] Read more.
Upwelling mantle plumes often instigate extensional stress within the continental crust of Earth. When stress exceeds crustal strength, extensional structures develop, reducing the effective stress and trigger magmatic processes at the crust–mantle boundary. However, such processes and their relationship to the formation of many surface structures remain poorly characterized on Mars. We identified a series of extensional structures in the southern highlands of Mars which collectively resemble continental rift zones on Earth. We further characterized these extensional structures and their surrounding region (area of ~1.8 M km2) by determining the surface mineralogy and bulk regional geochemistry of the terrain. In turn, this constrains their formation and yields a framework for their comparison with extensional structures on Earth. These terrains are notable for olivine and high-Ca pyroxene with a high abundance of potassium and calcium akin to alkali basalts. In the case of Mars, this Earth-like proto-plate tectonic scenario may be related to the plume-induced crustal stretching and considering their distribution and temporal relationship with the Hellas basin, we conclude that the plume is impact-induced. Overall, the findings of this work support the presence of mantle plume activity in the Noachian, as suggested by thermal evolution models of Mars. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Planetary Landscapes Analysis Based on Remote Sensing Images)
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31 pages, 6996 KiB  
Article
Recognition and Classification of Martian Chaos Terrains Using Imagery Machine Learning: A Global Distribution of Chaos Linked to Groundwater Circulation, Catastrophic Flooding, and Magmatism on Mars
by Hiroki Shozaki, Yasuhito Sekine, Nicholas Guttenberg and Goro Komatsu
Remote Sens. 2022, 14(16), 3883; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14163883 - 10 Aug 2022
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 2291
Abstract
Martian chaos terrains are fractured depressions consisting of block landforms that are often located in source areas of outflow channels. Numerous chaos and chaos-like features have been found on Mars; however, a global-scale classification has not been pursued. Here, we perform recognition and [...] Read more.
Martian chaos terrains are fractured depressions consisting of block landforms that are often located in source areas of outflow channels. Numerous chaos and chaos-like features have been found on Mars; however, a global-scale classification has not been pursued. Here, we perform recognition and classification of Martian chaos using imagery machine learning. We developed neural network models to classify block landforms commonly found in chaos terrains—which are associated with outflow channels formed by water activity (referred to as Aromatum-Hydraotes-Oxia-like (or AHO) chaos blocks) or with geological features suggesting volcanic activity (Arsinoes-Pyrrhae-like (or AP) chaos blocks)—and also non-chaos surface features, based on >1400 surface images. Our models can recognize chaos and non-chaos features with 93.9% ± 0.3% test accuracy, and they can be used to classify both AHO and AP chaos blocks with >89 ± 4% test accuracy. By applying our models to ~3150 images of block landforms of chaos-like features, we identified 2 types of chaos terrain. These include hybrid chaos terrain, where AHO and AP chaos blocks co-exist in one basin, and AHO-dominant chaos terrain. Hybrid chaos terrains are predominantly found in the circum-Chryse outflow channels region. AHO-dominant chaos terrains are widely distributed across Aeolis, Cydonia, and Nepenthes Mensae along the dichotomy boundary. Their locations coincide with regions suggested to exhibit upwelling groundwater on Hesperian Mars. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Planetary Landscapes Analysis Based on Remote Sensing Images)
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9 pages, 4653 KiB  
Technical Note
A Polygonal Terrain on Southern Martian Polar Cap: Implications for Its Formation Mechanism
by Lei Zhang, Yang Lu and Jinhai Zhang
Remote Sens. 2022, 14(22), 5789; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14225789 - 16 Nov 2022
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1392
Abstract
Polygonal terrains on a Martian southern polar cap have been observed in high-resolution images by the Mars Orbiter Camera. However, their formation mechanism is enigmatic due to the lack of constraints from their geometric and physical properties. Here we proposed a series of [...] Read more.
Polygonal terrains on a Martian southern polar cap have been observed in high-resolution images by the Mars Orbiter Camera. However, their formation mechanism is enigmatic due to the lack of constraints from their geometric and physical properties. Here we proposed a series of recognition procedures on an image of polygonal terrain located at Australe Scopuli taken by a High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment. Then, we quantitatively analyzed the areas, orientations and polygon edge densities (~0.10 to ~0.06 in different subregions) of the polygonal terrain. Based on the recognition results, three elevation-related subregions can be distinguished according to the distributions of polygon size and orientation. The two side subregions distribute relatively small and relatively large polygons, respectively. The middle subregion can be regarded as an intermediate zone along the slope (~1°). The intermediate zone is squeezed by the surrounding polygons, indicating a possible uplift or subsidence on previous or present Mars. This paper found a possible formation mechanism of the polygonal terrain located at the south pole of Mars, suggesting that polar-ice-cap polygons are formed during the process of lateral sliding gravity-driven plastic creep and the deformation of ice, with the polygon boundaries being reshaped during the alignment at high slopes and partially compressed at low slopes. These properties and possible formation mechanisms could provide more constraints on understanding ancient and/or present climates on Mars. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Planetary Landscapes Analysis Based on Remote Sensing Images)
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