MARS MAY YIELD GRANITE!

News Date: 22.02.2014

The research team from NASA has come out with on statement telling about the possible availability of granite, an igneous rock common on Earth Planet. For years Mars was considered geologically consisting mostly of one kind of rock i.e. basalt which covers most of the surface of Mars.

Researchers have found large amounts of feldspar, which is a important ingredient of granite, in an ancient Martian Volcano. The Location of the feldspar also provides an explanation for how granite could have formed on Mars. While the magma slowly cools under the subsurface, low density melt separates from dense crystals in a process called fractionation. The cycle is repeated over and over for millennia until granite is formed. Granite is often found on Earth in tectonically active regions.

The research team NASA concluded that prolonged magmatic activity on Mars can also produce granite on a large scale. According to James Wray from the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology, there are ample compelling evidence to date that Mars has granite rocks.

The research team has used remote sensing techniques with infrared spectroscopy to survey a large volcano on Mars that was active for billions of years.