Illustration of the Argyre impact basin in the southern highlands of Mars.
About 4 billion years ago an asteroid or comet collided with Mars creating what is known today as the Argyre impact basin in the southern highlands. A thousand miles across, Argyre is the second-largest impact basin on Mars after Hellas Planitia. The impacting object that created the basin is believed to have been about 30 miles in diameter. Within the basin are the relatively flat plains of Argyre Planitia. The perspective in this rendering is from a position about 25 degrees from Mars' south pole and 150 miles above the surface looking north. In the foreground is an impact-related arc of mountains known as the Charitum Montes, and on the upper right near the horizon is a partial view of Galle Crater, one of the "happy face" craters identified by the Viking Mars orbiters in the 1970s.
Size: 4892px × 3669px
Photo credit: © Walter Myers / Stocktrek Images / Alamy / Afripics
License: Royalty Free
Model Released: No
Keywords: alien, argyre, art, artwork, astrobiology, astrogeology, astronomical, astronomy, basin, charitum, close-, collision, color, craters, digitally, edge, exogeology, exploration, feature, generated, geography, geology, gully, highlands, horizon, horizontal, illustration, image, impact, land, landform, landscape, mars, montes, mountainous, mountains, object, objects, outdoors, people, plains, planet, planetary, planets, planitia, red, science, single, solar, space, surface, surreal, system, terrain, topography, vista
