Ganges Chasma Sand Sheet

One Image of the Day topics was the north polar sand sea and isolated dune fields at lower latitudes. Sand seas on Earth are often called 'ergs', an Arabic name for dune field. A sand sea differs from a dune field in two ways: 1) a sand sea has a large regional extent, and 2) the individual dunes are large in size and complex in form. This sand sheet is located in the Ganges Chasma portion of Valles Marineris. As with yesterday's image, note that the dune forms are seen only at the margin and that the interior of the sand sheet at this resolution appears to completely lack dune forms.