"Timothy Demko" wrote in message
...
mlm wrote:
Timothy Demko wrote---clip---

Now we have to get some mini-TES on those rocks. Cross-bedded sandstones
would be exciting enough, but just think about carbonates!
---clip---

The new images, especially in 3D, show what appear to be a number of other
depressions just beyond the one the MER is in. It's no wonder they got a
hole in one, if the course is all holes. There's also another, even more
prominent outcrop of bare rock visible in the distance.

Would one expect to see carbonates fixed in rocks when the atmosphere is
rich in CO2? Doesn't the large-scale fixation of CO2 in our atmosphere into
rock formations require living organisms, like diatoms? Assuming the stuff
we're looking at is built from layers of wind or water borne material, what
process converted it into rock? If it had to be under extreme pressure from
overlying layers to become rock, how would you get vertical movement of the
bedrock toward the surface without tectonic plates? Could you get this kind
of striation with many inundations of low-viscosity lava, for example?

Yes, I'm an engineer, but I didn't have anything better to do at the moment.


JJ Robinson II
Houston, TX
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