[imagesource: NASA]

Mars is moaning.

Don’t worry, though, the InSight Lander is listening closely.

Since the InSight landed on Mars back in 2018, it’s managed to detect some of the mysterious interior ramblings of the Red Planet.

Just before there’s any confusion about the many machines on Mars, the InSight Lander shouldn’t be confused with some of the other Mars rovers, robots, and helicopters such as Perseverance, Ingenuity, and Curiosity, doing different jobs all over its surface.

Roving on.

The Cerberus Fossae, a region near the Martian equator, is where all the action seems to be, and the InSight managed to hear two rumbles in that region.

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Registering magnitudes of 3.1 and 3.3 on March 7 and March 18 respectively, the quakes cement the Cerberus Fossae’s reputation as one of the most geologically active places on the Red Planet today.

Landslides in the Cerberus Fossae, indicating recent seismic activity. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona)

The rumblings are sometimes referred to as marsquakes but that’s because we are limited by the words we use for the phenomena we see on Earth.

In other words, the ramblings on Mars may not be caused by the same tectonic system that causes Earth’s earthquakes.

If it’s not volcanoes that are causing the movement on Mars, then InSight needs extra time to listen more deeply and sensitively, and it’s only recently that scientists have been able to detect seismic activity on Mars.

In 2019, scientists from InSight released the Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) on Mars and recorded the first marsquake.

Geologists were able to predict that InSight might hear quakes from the Cerberus Fossae region six years before the spacecraft even landed on Mars…

The geologists noticed from images taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter’s HiRISE camera that there was evidence of landslides and rocks moving around, which could only mean that there was some deep activity taking place.

Since then, technology has come a long way to be able to detect and differentiate movements from inside the planet and movement from the surface:

The InSight mission received a two-year extension in January, and in that time the team hopes to create a detailed record of Martian seismic activity.

To ensure the highest possible quality data, they have begun using the lander’s robotic arm to bury the SEIS instrument’s cable. Doing so will reduce wind noise, vibrations, and temperature fluctuations, all of which can interfere with the seismometer and disguise possible marsquake detections.

If InSight can record a big marsquake, scientists will be able to learn more about what’s at the heart of Mars, which is something we know very little about.

[sources:sciencealert&skynews]