Astronomy Picture of the Day - powered by LUNEXIT.IT

This image (such as the Contextual - or "CTX" - Frame) covers an area where we can see a (Geologically speaking) "fresh-looking" Impact Crater, located at about 35° South Latitude and having a diameter of about 2 Km (approx. 1,2 miles). As you can see, there are quite deep Gullies all around its steep Inner Slopes , and they can even be seen in the shadowed portion of the Crater, just by enhancing the brightness of that region. The fact that there are Gullies all around the circumference of the Crater, is very unsual, since many (probably almost all the) Impact Craters located at this Latitude of the Southern Hemisphere of Mars only have Gullies on their South-facing Slopes, which are almost completely shadowed during Wintertime. But this is an especially pristine Impact Crater and so its Inner Slopes may well still be particularly steep and, in a way, even unstable.
The enhanced Extra Detail Magnification (or "EDM" Frame ), shows that the Gullies and their Deposits have different colors and this is likely due not only to the fact that diverse Rock Types (---> Minerals) were exposed at the time of the Crater Formation, but also to the circumstance that these Gullies could have been recently active (so that their multiple - and, in a way, "emerging" - colors have not been yet homogenized (---> meaning turned into an homogeneous brown-dark orange color) by overlying Regolith (---> Soil) nor by Windblown Deposits (---> Sand, Dust, Particulate and, perhaps, even Ashes).

The NASA - Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter will monitor this Site in the future, so to see if the Gullies have changed and, therefore, if they are still currently active (which, however, is an extremely likely possibility, and even though we do not know - nor we have ways, for now, to find out - if such an activity is water-related or not).
Talking about the age of this Surface Feature, we asked ourselves how long ago this Impact Crater could have formed. Well, given that a precise dating of any Impact Crater is (obviously) nearly impossible, we can say, however, that it definitly appears pristine (since it is preserving Meter-scale Morphologies in its Ejecta Blanket, and since there are only a few Superimposed - and therefore younger - Impact Craters).

Said that, its age is (probably) less than a Million Years. Note that the Ejecta Blanket includes a "Herringbone" (---> a "spina di pesce") Texture, with V-shaped Features that are all pointing to the Source Crater.

Mars Local Time: 14:48 (Early Afternoon)
Coord. (centered): 35,002° South Lat. and 300,935° East Long.
Spacecraft altitude: 251,6 Km (such as about 157,2 miles)
Original image scale range: 25,2 cm/pixel (with 1 x 1 binning) so objects ~ 76 cm across are resolved
Map projected scale: 25 cm/pixel
Map projection: EQUIRECTANGULAR
Emission Angle: 4,0°
Phase Angle: 60,2°
Solar Incidence Angle: 63° (meaning that the Sun was about 27° above the Local Horizon at the time that the picture was taken)
Solar Longitude: 32,5° (Northern Spring/Southern Fall)
Credits: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

This frame has been colorized in Absolute Natural Colors by (such as the colors that a human eye would actually perceive if someone were onboard the NASA - Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and then looked down, towards the Surface of Mars), by using an original technique created - and, in time, dramatically improved - by the Lunar Explorer Italia Team.