Rocky mounds and a plateau on Mars

When Mars Express set sail for the crater named after Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan, it found a windblown plateau and mysterious rocky mounds nearby.


One possibility is that the top layer of rock was shattered by the shockwaves from an impact. Another possible explanation would be from a process called subrosion. On Mars, subrosion is widely observed when rising magma heats frozen ground water, which melts and removes subsurface material as it flows away. This leads to a honeycomb [...]

Full story at http://spacefellowship.com/news/art21129/rocky-mounds-and-a-plateau-on-mars.html