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Lipik Crater Channels, as seen by THEMIS. | |
| Planet | Mars |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | Coordinates: 38°25′S 248°26′W / 38.42°S 248.43°W |
| Diameter | 56 km |
Lipik Crater is a crater in the Hellas quadrangle of Mars, located at 38.42° S and 248.43° W. It is 56 km in diameter and was named after Lipik, a town in Croatia.[1] Close-up pictures of the crater show glacial features. The crater is not very deep, so much ice and dust may have accumulated over the years. If one measures the diameter of a crater, the original depth can be estimated with various ratios. Because of this relationship, researchers have found that many Martian craters contain a great deal of material; much of it is believed to be ice deposited when the climate was different.[2]
Glacier flows are visible in some of the pictures below from Lipik Crater.
Glaciers, loosely defined as patches of currently or recently flowing ice, are thought to be present across large but restricted areas of the modern Martian surface, and are inferred to have been more widely distributed at times in the past.[3][4] Lobate convex features on the surface known as viscous flow features and lobate debris aprons, which show the characteristics of non-Newtonian flow, are now almost unanimously regarded as true glaciers.[3][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]
A climate model, reported in the journal Science in 2006, found that large amounts of ice should accumulate in the Hellas region, in the same places like Lipik Crater where glaciers are observed. Water is transported from the south polar area to northern Hellas and falls as precipitation.[13]
Western side of Lipik Crater, as seen by CTX camera (on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter). Arrow points to a tongue-shaped glacier that is enlarged in next image.