Okay , show of hands . Who thinksthese sand dune on Marslook like the Batman signaling ? What about the Starfleet logotype , or something else ? Please show your working .
For now , I ’m officially declaring these feature of speech on the Red Planet the Batman Dunes of Mars . I ’m unsure if NASA will officially name them so , but hey , just a mesmerism .
These dunes – made of sand – are found near the North Pole of Mars . It ’s not a peculiarly newfangled image ; NASA ’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter snap it on January 28 , 2018 . NASA has re - exhaust the image in vividness , though , to give us a good sight of this realm of Mars .
In the paradigm , the scale is 25 centimeters ( 9.8 inches ) per pel , while North is “ up ” . It was taken by theHiRISE camera((High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment ) on the MRO .
We ’ve seenother viewsof these dunes , such as this snap back in 2014 . late images have looked a moment more standardised to theStarfleet logo .
The shape of the dunes are the result of fart on Mars , which can progress to up to 100 kilometer per hour ( 60 mile per hour ) at times . They ’re scientifically known asbarchan dunes , and form when malarkey blows constantly in one direction , with the small amount of sand on offer causing the sand dune to be sequestrate from each other .
We see evidence for similarly shaped dunes on Earth . Sometimes these have stretch arms triggered by vegetation hang on to the George Sand . Of of course , that ’s not the case on Mars , and we do also get these Mars - esque sand dune too .
NASA highlighted another feature in the image at the top , though , namely what ’s on the ground between the dunes . Here there are parallel dark and light stripes moving across the area , with the glowering stripes hold back pot of boulders at regular intervals .
“ What organized these boulders into neatly - spaced wad ? ” NASA writes in astatement . “ In the Arctic back on Earth , rocks can be organized by a summons called ‘ Robert Lee Frost heave . ’ With frost heave , repeatedly immobilise and warming of the earth can bring rocks to the control surface and organize them into agglomerate , stripes , or even circles .
“ On Earth , one of these temperature cycles film a year , but on Mars , it might be connected to changes in the major planet ’s cranial orbit around the Sun that take much longer . ”
