The North Pole of Mars is a raised spiral, and each winter a new layer, roughly a meter thick, of carbon dioxide ice gets deposited over it. Strong cold winds rush down from the center of the pole. Mars’s spin creates a Coriolis effect that makes the winds spiral out as they descend. When they cross a depression in the surface, it creates a vortex that erodes the depression deeper. As the depressions deepen and merge, they form the troughs seen here. For more, see this post. (Image credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin; NASA MGS MOLA Science Team; via APOD)
Martian Polar Spiral

Leave a Reply