Lucus Planum is a region on

Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It is also known as the "Red Planet", because of its orange-red appearance. Mars is a desert-like rocky planet with a tenuous carbon dioxide () atmosphere. At the average surface level the atmosph ...

, named after an albedo feature. Its name was approved by the IAU in 1997. The center latitude of the feature is 4.99 degrees S and the center longitude is 182.83 degrees. It lies just to the east and north east of the volcano Apollinaris Patera. Lucus Planum lies in both the

Memnonia quadrangle The Memnonia quadrangle is one of a series of 30 quadrangle maps of Mars used by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Astrogeology Research Program. The Memnonia quadrangle is also referred to as MC-16 (Mars Chart-16). The quadrangle i ...

and the

Aeolis quadrangle The Aeolis quadrangle is one of a series of list of quadrangles on Mars, 30 quadrangle maps of Mars used by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Astrogeology Research Program. The Aeolis quadrangle is also referred to as MC-23 (Mars Chart-2 ...

s. It is part of a region called the "

Medusae Fossae Formation The Medusae Fossae Formation is a large geological formation of probable volcanic origin on the planet Mars. It is named for the Medusa of Greek mythology. "Fossae" is Latin for "trenches". The formation is a collection of soft, easily eroded de ...

" Part of this region is covered with

yardangs A yardang is a streamlined protuberance carved from bedrock or any consolidated or semiconsolidated material by the dual action of wind abrasion by dust and sand and deflation (the removal of loose material by wind turbulence). Yardangs become e ...

. They are formed by the action of wind on sand sized particles; hence they often point in the direction that the winds were blowing when they were formed. Views of yardangs in this region are shown below. 44777yardangcontext.jpg, Wide context view of surface of Lucus Planum, as seen with CTX. 44777yardangcontextclose.jpg, Closer view of yardangs from previous image, as seen with CTX. ESP 044777 1725yardangs.jpg, Wide view of yardangs in Lucus Planum, as seen by

HiRISE High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment is a camera on board the '' Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter'' which has been orbiting and studying Mars since 2006. The 65 kg (143 lb), US$40 million instrument was built under the direction ...

under

HiWish program HiWish is a program created by NASA so that anyone can suggest a place for the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter to photograph. It was started in January 2010. In the first few months of the program 3000 people signed up to use HiR ...

44777 1725yardangs2.jpg, Close view of yardangs in previous image, as seen by HiRISE under HiWish program 44777 1725yardangsclose.jpg, Close view of yardangs from a previous image, as seen by HiRISE under HiWish program

References

{{Mars-stub Plains on Mars Extraterrestrial plateaus Memnonia quadrangle Aeolis quadrangle

See also

References