Wind and water shaped coral-like veins on Mars, NASA says

NASA’s Curiosity rover has imaged a delicate, coral-like rock in Gale Crater, revealing a branching structure about an inch wide that formed when mineral-rich water infiltrated cracks and later dried, leaving veins that wind exposed over eons.

Captured on July 24, the feature was shot with Curiosity’s ChemCam Remote Micro Imager, and a similar specimen, nicknamed Paposo, was examined at close range by the rover’s arm-mounted MAHLI camera the same day.

A branching rock shaped by ancient water

NASA explains that long ago, liquid water carried dissolved minerals into tiny fractures in Martian rock; when the water evaporated, it left hardened mineral veins.

Over immense timescales, sand-laden winds eroded the softer host rock while leaving the tougher veins behind, producing the intricate, coral-like patterns now exposed at the surface.

Did you know?
Curiosity previously documented a tiny flower-shaped rock in 2022, formed by mineralizing fluids, underscoring how non-biological processes can mimic life-like shapes on Mars.

How Curiosity captured the view

The high-resolution, telescopic ChemCam Remote Micro Imager recorded the roughly 1-inch-wide feature in black and white on July 24, during the rover’s ongoing traverse of Gale Crater.

That same timeframe, MAHLI acquired close-up images of a 2-inch-wide, wind-eroded rock dubbed Paposo from just a few centimeters away, providing fine detail of the vein-dominated textures.

ALSO READ | How NASA’s new AI doctor could treat astronauts on Mars

Why it’s not biological

Despite the coral-like appearance, scientists emphasize the structure is entirely geological, created by fluid-driven mineralization and subsequent erosion rather than any marine life analog on Mars.

The process is common on Earth and has produced similarly striking formations on Mars before, including a flower-shaped rock documented in 2022.

Clues to Gale Crater’s watery past

Curiosity has encountered many such features during its 13-year mission, each reinforcing evidence that the crater once hosted water that could have supported habitable environments.

By mapping where these vein networks occur and linking them to surrounding sediments, researchers refine timelines for when water moved through the rocks and how the climate shifted to today’s arid state.

Next questions for the mission

Follow-up targets include vein-rich rocks that can preserve mineral chemistry and textures diagnostic of past fluids, helping decode pH, salinity, and temperature conditions.

Working together, RMI and MAHLI, along with other tools, can help determine how common these water-related events were in the layers of Gale Crater.

Curiosity’s ongoing work in Gale Crater continues to surface small but revealing records of ancient water, with each wind-sculpted vein adding definition to Mars’ long transition from a wetter world to a cold desert.