Meridiani outcrop

hrtbreak wrote:

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?

Not to criticize your other speculations, but diatoms secrete
siliceous tests, not carbonate. There are other critters, of
course, that DO turn CO2 into CO3 in rocks.


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?


We don't really know how consolidated it is - it may not have had
to be under "extreme" pressure. On earth sediments lithify with
proper cement and not too much pressure. As for the tilting,
maybe by the impact process that formed the crater. Given the
small scale of the outcrop (about 4" they say), those would be
VERY thin lava flows. Possible, yes; probable - ?


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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Richard I. Gibson, Gibson Consulting
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