Proof of Liquid Standing Pools at Craters on Mars-Liquid Water Possibly

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A find by MPJ, also known as Mars Photo Journal, of a large bright object on a steep slope in HiRISE image PSP_010423_1720, associated with bright material in the layered and recently exposed terrain, additional to this view of a possible source of liquid water standing in bodies around impact craters, has nearly proven beyond any doubt that liquids, especially water, can, and do, exist on Mars, and at times will erode the terrain of the flatter areas where the crater energy sources occur. As to whether the liquid existed prior to, or after the impact, and what the true composition of the liquid is, we can only expect it will probably be water.
The crater is 120 pixels wide in diameter.
The standing eroded pool depression is about 600 pixels in diameter, and has substantial depth. Can someone estimate the total liquid volume in the pool surrounding the crater?

Can this be another of the many proofs of liquids on Mars?

Are there any weaknesses to the argument, and are the bright item of MPJ's discovery, and the crater at the approximate source of the bright object, a pair of related items?

Can we assume the liquid was water?
Was the liquid a impact produced event?
Is there a volume of ice in the layered terrain, or is this a climate factored event?
Is there any other explanation for the eroded margin area around the crater?
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A overview image of the steep slope where the crater area shows a liquid drainage away from the deeply eroded standing pool.
Some may prefer to regard this as an impact ejecta surge of particulates which has eroded to a depth, giving the appearance of a body of liquid, however the solids would not have taken the channel path evidenced in the image here marked as blue arrows, to the cliff edge where the liquid would be carried down the slope. There are other signs of possible short term liquid erosion travel across this cliff edge, all traveling to this same point of transport down the slope face. Looking for additional evidence of a liquid erosion or transport down this path will be important.
To secure the presence of a liquid in the erosion, will require some detective work over time. This is a fairly recent event, and for that reason the possible presence of a liquid, probably water, is more important than the aged recorded events of the distant past.
To show a liquid can be a surviving surface feature on Mars would be a major discovery. To show that erosion is produced on Mars in recent history by a liquid is an additional significant discovery, if sustained by other persons investigations, and shown in the image records.
This image is taken at size 1 to 8, sharpened to 3.64, DR set to approximately 0.03, and the location of the crater, x=5275, y=39600.
The marked arrows are:
Light Blue- Liquid transport suspected to edge of slope from crater.

Yellow- The crater and eroded depression margin.

Green- The possible path of a bright object to an alcove, and down a ravine/gully structure, possibly from the impact event. The objects may, or may not, be related, but this is the source path of the bright item marked on the slope.

Red- The bright object found by MPJ which has bounced and rolled end over end(long axis, apparently) down the steep slope from the alcove or beyond. The object is very bright and resembles ice in brightness.

The topic image, is taken at 1 to 1 size, sharpened to 3.64, with a DR of approximately 0.03, altered in XNView with increased contrast(15 points), and a reduction in Gamma(to 0.75). The JP2 image has been rotated slightly to orient the items in the monitor, then re-rotated to near original position.
The selected images were taken with the IAS viewer for JP2's from the MRO/HiRISE satellite, from the main color image, PSP_010423_1720.
The HiRISE site, and the mission program, are worked, overseen, and hosted, by NASA,LPL,JPL,University of Arizona(Arizona.edu), and measurements taken with the VMN Toolbox feature for browsers.
All observations should be confirmed for content and accuracy at the Gallery/catalog of HiRISE images, from the originals directly.
Other file types, and supporting images are obtainable at my image host in my name, danajohnson0, at ImageShack.us.
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A JPG, not marked.
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Hopefully MPJ will add the additional images of the bright object on the slope, or I can add that, and I am preparing additional images of the closeup details of the scene.

Comments and criticisms welcome.
MPJ has found a very impressive location, and event, I believe.

Can this be proof of current standing liquid on Mars in human historical timing?

Thanks for the compliment Dana and i can return it
Just a quick note from me as iam busy at work today. Your additional observations are to say the least very interesting and kept me studying this HiRISE observation!
Ill second your conclusions and do see further indications of (heavy-) erosion on this elevated plain as well as other things - but i need time to picture and document it.
Iam sure you noticed the larger crater structures almost eroded to ground level at 4100, 20500 (IRB map-oriented), best seen at 0.25 zoom.

more later
the name is Stephan by the way

Crater appears to be filling with wind blown dustand the rim shows the effect of abrasion suggesting it is not a recent feature.
Ejecta from the impact appears to be chunks of rock ( ice would have sublimated).

Light colored material in bottom of crater more likely dust than liquid and is similar to dust associated linear dunes in the area.

"eroded margin" may actually be dunes deposited since impact.

Where is the water?

Fred

I'll work on the imaging of the 3D depth involved in the very clear DEPRESSED body of the otherwise 'ejecta blanket' margin structure at this recent crater. This crater has a nearby 'cousin' as well, nearly identical. If the process here is impact, when do we find sufficient mirroring of events and content to discount the very old appearing crater to the side which is a near perfect duplicate? There is far too much of this type of co-incidence on Mars for this to be a non-involved process indicator as a possibility. If the side-by-side crater shape is a item of a local process, this would change the entire subscription to a water erosion source, only, and would bring an explosive gas/water or other liquid into mind.

Ben, this cannot be a dry ejecta blanket blast downward as might appear, in even a soft layered matrix. There is the grey powder accumulation, but that leaves water or liquid in recent history a possibility, as we both know the desiccating effects of vacuum and little vapor pressure. The margins of this deep, depressed, area, is deepest at the outer periphery, contradicting the physics of any dry impact surge. An air burst above the surface might give some downward impacting direction, even though we see the kinetic energy was re-directed upward by the crater bowl shape, but the ejecta has been cleared, and NOT refilled. The mass removed is great in comparison to the small impactor mass. We do see small items as debris, but they are along one side only, and along the incident direction at the foreground of the non-circular part of the crater bowl. This had a forward motion, and the materials are now removed, with the shallow channel in a differing direction transporting a great volume to a very well incised, rounded, and deeply eroded waterfall type gully formation. That eroded gully is the key to the question-mark. The cliff-side gully is the conjoining of several shallow meander paths which are the cleared ejecta materials of several craters now eroded and filled to the near rim surface elevation. The gully is the key to a transport type which is not suspended in the air mass. That is very important. Water transports mass that way, not wind.
Throughout this area, is a collapse network of dendritic depressed channels which are massive. Even if we consider simple sublimation of ices and frost, the scene is lacking a process for the mass involved.

Pleased to receive the criticism of the simple analogy to liquids in a depressed erosion scene, but the several lows all correspond to a single gully path of erosion/removal, and the path is very worn in unique local typing. It must be a water path of the past. What would a climatic ice sheet give after impacts such as these?
Would this area appear differently than the Phoenix location, if ice can be established as formerly present?
I have seen many water conduits, and wind forms, but the gully is definitely not a wind product, and it is a gravity controlled by-product of local mass removal/transport in addition to appearing as a water eroded shape.
The blog is holding my additional image and entry as yet, so you may not have seen the information my statement is based upon. I'm writing to Mark to attempt to have the entry released for view.
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In the interim, here is an additional link image for use. More soon, in support of this. Have we ever seen a entirely missing depressed ejecta zone? I believe not, on Mars, nor anywhere else.
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I have a Digg entry of the topic, images.
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While preparing a few detailed images, this is the map oriented image in small JPEG file type, of the scene full frame. I've only touched the surface of this, and yet I am convinced that this is not a dry event set of items. Wind absolutely never transports several meandering paths in different directions to a common gravity shallow dipping path into a cliff side drop-off.
There will always, even in the very cold, be a transport of a straight line, or a turbulence which is chaotic or varied, never a singular merging varied directional flow of solids transported by a local small scale wind pattern. It really cannot happen, as the mass, especially on Mars, cannot travel competing directions, and the mass involved will seek the shortest path, not a circuitous meander path, and never in conflicting directions. Water vapor generally should be doing that on Mars inherently, as well, but we have the morning and evening air charge which may carry more than the daily wind, or a large fraction of the smaller particle collection.
I thought in making my assertions that the missing first entry would be present by the posting of responses, so I apologize for the missing information. Still trying to get it included here.
Closeups should solve the matter eventually.

Pending any additional closeups, here is the IRB color JPEG scene metioned by Stephan, of MPJ, who has suggested ice may be the bright objects content.
The crater missing ejecta margin, is the added mystery, and the addition of a coalescing set of several channels meeting to a common low elevation shallow drop-off which contradicts wind as the moving force, and the fact that the merging low transport path is not at all a sharp edged alcove, but a modeled downspout type path, as in a cave water pater, makes the scene one of a cavern system with a missing upper cover. A missing roof layer may have been ice, or, a solid long gone layer which was removed and totally dis-assembled. I favor the simple erosion over time, with the addition of water or ives to the location.
There is another aspect I didn't mention, and that is the presence of very active small block faulting/tectonics which are producing offsets. While that system can destroy integrity, it will not transport or remove much unless it is aided by water or another removal process. If we find some of this area a few miles down the 'roed', we'll be adding a new chapter to the Mars natural history manual. Faulting and horizontal tectonics is as interesting for me as waters possible role on Mars.
I'll present this if you or another doesn't do that for me first.
All images welcome on this topic. Thanks.

The general HiRISE image page for all originals.

"...of water or ives[ices] to the location."

correction, above.

Digg URL for this.

This is an even better link, as this is a search for item '1720' at HiRISE, giving a good collection of the images of Ius Chasma, the general location of the PSP_010423_1720 imaged spot.
Other images show water tributary and erosional features, sulphates in abundance probably, and a very busy and active geology.
Some of the collection are of other Chasma and related terrain types. 73 large JP2 locations.
Lots of imaging in the mix. Much evidence of possible water paths at times. What was the timing for surface details?

The prior overview image was not visibly obvious, but it was close to the real scene in bright desert lighting, as we see the scenes.
This is a altered view of the details, and while it is small and lacks resolution, it shows some of the directional transport paths taken by missing solids presumably.
I'll work on closeups, as I promised.
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Other file types are loaded at ImageShack.us for viewing at smaller KB sizes(JPEG's).

These two altered variations of the leftmost section of the crater outer ejecta margin shows the direction which is a stand still path, one along which wind would and apparently did organize the materials around the crater. This is not a continuous down-slope path apparently, but is a depressed zone in which sediment might have refilled and reconstructed a localized pattern. I haven't enough time today for more images, but the right side path is the direction of solids loss and movement, towards the cliff face, now dominated by the wind and dry events such as ripple rebuilding for whatever the time passage since the impact or the possible 'wet' period. As to the information in this section, I can only say that the zone of no movement over great or long periods of time would leave margins as deep at the outer margin only if a removal or alteration process were active, as in water, acids, brine's, or other erosional processes which were not producing a chaotic mass of breakage and additional coverage.
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More image tomorrow again. Ben still has the floor with these apparent wind dominated scenes of organized dune/ripples within the limits of the impact.
Could the very bright item at the slope below have been the cause of such a small crater event? I wonder about the timing of both, and the actual reason for this many craters at the small area. An exhumation is apparently underway possibly, as Ben states, but why the newer cratering in preference here, with such a energetic throw-out, and so little surface damage right at the crater? An impact that could raise the outer margins to a new pattern, loss of material, and a directional pattern, surely would do more damage to a powdery weak layered surface material if the material is weak as the movement of material suggests.
Notice how little material appears to be travelling out of the domain towards the cliff face here on the left side. This is gravity path neutral here apparently. Not much wind blown loss here, but some elevation loss front to back, and crater to margin.

Before i add some new indications i like to sum up my contributions to the chain of indication until now as this is the related topic now:

First thing we started with an observation of a downhill chunk of ice (as most possible explanation of this bright feature). This object is about the size of a car.

A usefull comparison in regards of how ice is appearing in HiRISE color data is this observation: PSP_010086_2615 (very interesting crater as well)
Ice appears bright white in both IRB and RGB HiRISE color products. Additionaly it has a bluish glow in IRB data which correspond to the above observation in IRB.

The next observation is a shadow part of the cliff upslope the path of that chunk of ice, showing bright material covering the bedrock. Its not clear wether it is some sort of ice, frost, snow or just bright sand:

Dana then started to look further up (north) and made the above well described observations...

Additionaly i made a broader context view of Danas observations which may help to gather a better understanding of the situation:

Also i pictured an example of a gully (maybe the gully Dana mentioned above) which may be some crack because of surface tension which has been further exploited by flowing liquids:

further observations shortly: Northern edge of the elavated plain shows a lot of channeling features containing bright deposits maybe a further indication of liquids at work here imo

Another fresh crater with clearly visible ejecta streaks around in the middle of the image strip showing no real crater like depression, instead its almost flattened already - wind erosion at fast pace?

Ben, i agree that sublimation at this hights is a major problem because of the low air pressure here but all this visual indications
here shows evidence of liquids envolved in erosion processes. The key question is the time - is this kind of erosion ongoing at present as fresh craters suggests or are these remnants from other climatic ages.
Not to underestimate wind activity as well.

Dana,

That is way over my head brother. I prefer this image with the pooled water still in the crater with steam rising up in that cold, cold atmosphere.

If people can not see that, then they is blind.

Fred

Image

Before i add some new indications i like to sum up my contributions to the chain of indication until now as this is the related topic now:

First thing we started with an observation of a downhill chunk of ice (as most possible explanation of this bright feature). This object is about the size of a car.

A usefull comparison in regards of how ice is appearing in HiRISE color data is this observation: PSP_010086_2615 (very interesting crater as well)
Ice appears bright white in both IRB and RGB HiRISE color products. Additionaly it has a bluish glow in IRB data which correspond to the above observation in IRB.

The next observation is a shadow part of the cliff upslope the path of that chunk of ice, showing bright material covering the bedrock. Its not clear wether it is some sort of ice, frost, snow or just bright sand:

Dana then started to look further up (north) and made the above well described observations...

Additionaly i made a broader context view of Danas observations which may help to gather a better understanding of the situation:

Also i pictured an example of a gully (maybe the gully Dana mentioned above) which may be some crack because of surface tension which has been further exploited by flowing liquids:

further observations shortly: Northern edge of the elavated plain shows a lot of channeling features containing bright deposits maybe a further indication of liquids at work here imo

Another fresh crater with clearly visible ejecta streaks around in the middle of the image strip showing no real crater like depression, instead its almost flattened already - wind erosion at fast pace?

Ben, i agree that sublimation at this hights is a major problem because of the low air pressure here yet all this visual indications
here shows evidence of liquids envolved in erosion processes. The key question is the time - is this kind of erosion ongoing at present as local,fresh craters suggests or are these remnants from other climatic ages.
Not to underestimate wind activity as well.

p.s. Fred i would classify your picture as almost bulletproof evidence of pooling water. Where is it located, maybe HiRISE coverage?

Dana; I am confused. What is the relationship between the image in reply 10 and 11 ?

Ben,

Why no comment on my image? Can you see the water pooling and the steam or is it just dust rising from a smooth pool of dust?

Fred

Now I do not mean to hijack my dear friend Dana’s thread but while he is trying to simplify his rationale for the regular folk I will entertain the crowd.

Water in crater floors is nothing new. This next image is water that has erupted in a crater floor and has frozen. It is not old because it is still there, not because it is white. This whiteness must be from new frost deposition. Why? Because the poles are white. Without new snow and ice deposition the poles would be covered in dust and so would this feature.

How do we know that this ice was once liquid? Because it formed after impact. We know it is still there because of water vapor and occasional wet eruptions today. How do we know this? Because of the frost or snow on the crater wall down wind clearly visible, high humidity folks. Image below.

Now for a little Bot beating. The bots say that Mars has .003 percent water with less than .0001 precipable microns. The visible data shows micro-climate. So much for Bots. The dust folk can not even see the water in reply 12, we need boots to pour the water out of a cup or they will never believe it.

Fred

Fred; Why would I dispute the "atmosphere man".
Tell me what weather conditions would allow the ice to remain clouds to form daily? and the ice surface to be replenished with frost.

correction---ice to remain, clouds to form ---