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Recent bright gully deposits on Mars: Wet or dry flow?

¹ Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona 85721, USA
² Department of Planetary Sciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona 85721, USA
³ United States Geological Survey, Astrogeology Program, 2255 N Gemini Drive, Flagstaff, Arizona 86001, USA

Bright gully sediments attributed to liquid water flow have been deposited on Mars within the past several years. To test the liquid water flow hypothesis, we constructed a high-resolution (1 m/pixel) photogrammetric digital elevation model of a crater in the Centauri Montes region, where a bright gully deposit formed between 2001 and 2005. We conducted one-dimensional (1-D) and 2-D numerical flow modeling to test whether the deposit morphology is most consistent with liquid water or dry granular flow. Liquid water flow models that incorporate freezing can match the runout distance of the flow for certain freezing rates but fail to reconstruct the distributary lobe morphology of the distal end of the deposit. Dry granular flow models can match both the observed runout distance and the distal morphology. Wet debris flows with high sediment concentrations are also consistent with the observed morphology because their rheologies are often similar to that of dry granular flows. As such, the presence of liquid water in this flow event cannot be ruled out, but the available evidence is consistent with dry landsliding.

Key Words: Mars • fluvial • mass wasting • numerical model