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NASA scientists have found evidence that thousands of massive ancient volcanoes erupted on Mars. The so-called "super eruptions" occurred in a region of northern Mars called Arabia Terra over a period of 500 million years dating back approximately 4 billion years.... ...Using images from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer, they studied the walls of canyons and craters from hundreds to thousands of miles away from the calderas, identifying volcanic minerals turned into clay by water. They made three-dimensional topographic maps of Arabia Terra and compared mineral data to the maps in order to see that the layers...

"Meridani Planum is located on the equator due east of the giant canyons of Valles Marineris. It is a subsection region inside Arabia Terra, the largest of the transition zones between the lower elevation vast plains of the northern hemisphere and the higher elevation crater southern highlands."

The Mars Express probe has photographed the classic surface feature on the Red Planet's surface known as "The Face". The mountain, which looks just like a human head with eyes, mouth and nostrils, was first pictured by the US Viking 1 Orbiter in 1976. The formation instantly became the stuff of myth and conspiracy theories, with some claiming it was evidence of an ancient Martian civilisation. The new European images of The Face were taken in July this year. It has been something of a struggle for scientists to get a decent shot of the area in mid-northern latitudes referred...