• DOI:10.1126/SCIENCE.282.5396.2053
• Corpus ID: 23452496

Observations of the north polar region of Mars from the Mars orbiter laser altimeter.

@article{Zuber1998ObservationsOT,
  title={Observations of the north polar region of Mars from the Mars orbiter laser altimeter.},
  author={Maria T. Zuber and D. E. Smith and Sean C. Solomon and James B. Abshire and Robert S. Afzal and Oded Aharonson and Kathryn Elspeth Fishbaugh and Peter G. Ford and Herbert V. Frey and James B. Garvin and James W. Head and Anton Ivanov and C. L. Johnson and Duane O. Muhleman and Gregory A. Neumann and Gordon H. Pettengill and Roger J. Phillips and X. Sun and H. Jay Zwally and William Bruce Banerdt and Thomas C. Duxbury},
  journal={Science},
  year={1998},
  volume={282 5396},
  pages={
          2053-60
        }
}

• M. Zuber, D. Smith, +18 authors T. Duxbury
• Published 11 December 1998
• Environmental Science, Physics
• Science

Elevations from the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) have been used to construct a precise topographic map of the martian north polar region. The northern ice cap has a maximum elevation of 3 kilometers above its surroundings but lies within a 5-kilometer-deep hemispheric depression that is contiguous with the area into which most outflow channels emptied. Polar cap topography displays evidence of modification by ablation, flow, and wind and is consistent with a primarily H2O composition. Correlation of topography with images suggests that the cap was more spatially extensive in the past. The cap volume of 1.2 x 10(6) to 1.7 x 10(6) cubic kilometers is about half that of the Greenland ice cap. Clouds observed over the polar cap are likely composed of CO2 that condensed out of the atmosphere during northern hemisphere winter. Many clouds exhibit dynamical structure likely caused by the interaction of propagating wave fronts with surface topography.