Recent aqueous alteration associated to sedimentary volcanism on Mars

Sedimentary volcanism, whereby material is brought to the surface by fluid overpressure, has been proposed to explain some of the periglacial landforms, including pitted cones, in the Northern Plains of Mars. However, in the absence of convincing mineralogical evidence, the origin for these deposits has never been conclusively determined. Here we conduct a remote sensing-based mineralogical survey to identify hydrated minerals within the Thumbprint Terrains and neighbouring Vastitas Borealis Formation. We detect several occurrences of hydrated silica along with sulfate salts in candidate mud volcano-like morphologies which likely formed during the Early Amazonian period, supporting the sedimentary volcanism origin. Buoyancy-driven analytical modelling suggests the hydrated silica and sulfate salts are sourced from reservoirs at depths of several 10 s and 100 s of metres, respectively below the Thumbprint Terrains and Vastitas Borealis Formation. The exposed sulfates may have been derived from ancient buried evaporite deposits suggesting, at least locally, a salt-rich aqueous origin for the Vastitas Borealis Formation, and would be consistent with the presence of a past northern ocean on Mars.