Metamorphic Rock?

L257R1:

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Looks like it would make a nice countertop...

How long has it been balanced like that?

Well, that's the weirdest rock I've seen so far. Could be a glassy rock, which gives it that "oil on water" look.

Spectacular find Horton. It does look metamorphic, that implies very active geology. You would need layered deposition, then heat and pressure, etc. Maybe this is an earth meteorite?

Very nice image! Have you given the rock/feature a name?

My guess is it's volcanic or igneous. To have a metamorphic rock, you need to have a mechanism to cycle crust like tectonics.

It looks like an iron-manganese oxide coating that you would see on rocks in certain aqueous weathering conditions. Alternatively, liesegang alteration/diagenesis - please look up if you don't know this term. Both imply 'wetness'.
If the banding is three dimensional, rather than a surface coating, it would be very interesting and unlike any other rock we have seen to date.
But Hort, this is horticolor! What are the actual colours in your opinion?

Hi Newboy

I got very similar colours using the 257 images and with no colour balancing. I suspect that they are close to true colours whatever that is. At least there is colour differentiation of that rock surface into the multicoloured hues (whatever they are) that the colour compositing process shows up.

If your surmise is right about Fe Mn O coating, what is the likelihood of geologically recent water being involoved?

Winston

Winston

I once found a place with hundreds of balanced rocks along the Snaring River in Jasper National Park in Alberta.

I realized that many visiters to this spot had been amused by the improbability of such a thing and had added to the collection. I and my 4 kids gleefully added our own contributions.

As I pontificated earlier, life -- at least on the Earth -- is a geological process and at least in one spot on the Earth there is evidence that rocks have a sense of humor.

I wonder if Martian rocks have a "funny bone"?

The color may be synthetic, but the fact that there IS color banding, nto the actual colors, is significant. I do not see how this pattern could be a surface features, especailly in the sand blasted environment of Gusev. This is an important rock to study, seems to be unique.

Horton...Nice...

Just cropped and enhanced a little.
Have you take a closer look to the pignose like extremity?
Really curious and out of place piece of rock...

That ... thing .... looks really strange.

Would like to have a closer look.. * sigh *

Quick thoughts:

Not metamorphic, unless Mars had plate tectonics.

Chemical precipitate?

Hematite similar to the blocky hematite that Oppy has seen?

Almost (and I do say almost) looks like a BIF. (banded iron formation...wouldn't that be cool?) Would explain the curved banding (soft-sediment deformation).

Or the banding could be a flow banding in an obsidian.

Not metamorphic.

Blocky hematite?

Flow-banded obsidian?

Banded Iron Formation (bif...that'd be cool)?

I like this game, i just hope they inspect this closer for the answer.
Is there any copper on mars? Kinda looks like a peacock ore.
Volcanic bomb, 2nd guess.

The darker dust tailings, around the bases of the rocks, remind me of the iron(hematite), at meridiani.

Yeah mann, it looks like it just dropped in from somewhere. I've found a pancam shot of it from sol 461, different angle, extreme right of image:

[link]

The rock next to it looks like it is just sitting on top of the bedrock too. (And, very quietly, it looks like a hedgehog.)

I made an anaglyph of it:
mars.hynee.com/spirit-sol461-rgb-167293127-l_r-L7R1.jpg.html

L234567R123 of reply 0 rock:

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In this lighting and filter combination there is less suggestion ( in fact none) that it is metamorphic. The rock behind still whispers "rock hedge".

OFF Subject
Horton:

Looks like 40 miles of rough road ahead for Oppy. Would you please do a panorama of the Pancam Oppy Sol 454, and post it on Opportunity Stuck ? There are 97 images, but I hope I’m not asking too much…

Thanks, Henry

Heney, IF Oppy is stuck I am sure there will be better pancam panoramas than the downsampled 24 sets of L1/R1/R2 images of Sol 454.

If not, this it's just another spot in an endless desert at a moment in time.

I'll wait. After looking at what I think is Oppy's current position I think it will be on it's way in a few days.

Now back to our regularly scheduled program.

Beautiful image!
Yes JMS, it does look a bit like a piece of BIF. As improbable as that might seem I suppose it is possible...that would be amazing if that were the case!!! It is likely a chunk of basalt flung from a crater during meteorite impact.

But what if (big IF) it was a chunk of BIF?
Where would it have come from? Debris from a deep meteorite impact on Mars? What IF it was a BIF chunk that arrived as a meteorite from Earth???