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Planet Mars: Story of Another World

2009; Wiley; Volume: 90; Issue: 19 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1029/2009eo190008

2324-9250

A. Leatherland,

Space Science and Extraterrestrial Life

Mars has captured the imagination of people throughout the ages, inspiring many stories. Remarkably, though, little was known about the red planet until recently. Through a great deal of exploration and theory, planetary scientists have striven to correct this situation. Over the course of the past half century, since the first flyby of Mars by NASA's Mariner 4 spacecraft in 1967, a multitude of probes have landed on, orbited, and flown past the planet. From these missions, a great deal has been learned about Mars. Its surface has now been studied to a respectable level of detail, revealing an astonishing amount of information about volcanoes such as Olympus Mons in Mars's Tharsis region; about the gigantic Valles Marineris (Valley of Wonder), the largest known canyon in the solar system; and about lava flows, outflow channels, and the Martian regolith, among many other aspects of the planet.