HiRISE: Beauty of layered stratigraphy

ESP_017833_1975The layered bedrock in this image was brought from several kilometers of depth during the formation of this 44 kilometer wide crater in the volcanic plains of Lunae Planum.

As these layers were exhumed and brought to nearly vertical orientations, faulting and fracturing occurred and breccia dikes formed. Breccias are rocks consisting of angular and sharp fragments, and a dike is a fracture that has been widened by forces pulling apart the rock while simultaneously filling it… [More at link]

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