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The Transport of Extrusive Volcanic Deposits on Jezero Crater Through Paleofluvial Processes

Jezero, an impact crater in the Syrtis Major quadrangle of Mars, is generally thought to have amassed a large body of liquid water in its ancient past. NASA spectra of the proposed paleolake interpret the youngest surface unit as olivine-bearing minerals crystallized from magma. In early 2021, the Perseverance rover landed at the leading edge of a fan-delta deposit northwest of Jezero, an area argued to have experienced two distinct periods of fluvial activity. Surface imagery obtained by Perseverance reveal partially buried and unburied vesicular and non-vesicular rocks that appear volcanic in origin, emplaced sometime during the Noachian-Hesperian boundary. The absence of volcanic extrusive features along the fan-delta deposit, however, have made the origin of these ballast deposits a matter of contention among planetary scientists. To establish the origin of these basalt-like rocks, a comparison was made between analogous deposits on the Moenkopi Plateau in Arizona with similar deposits imaged by Perseverance on Jezero. The search for geologic analogs along the Moenkopi Plateau were guided by observable similarities in surface geomorphology, influenced and modified by fluvial, eolian, and past volcanic activity, primarily from the Late Pleistocene-Holocene boundary. By analyzing surface imagery taken by Perseverance and comparing it with the analogue site, we hypothesize that the exposed vesicular rocks imaged by Perseverance were likely transported into the paleolake by geomorphic interactions, specifically fluvial processes similarly to the deposits that were transported along drainage patterns we observed on the Moenkopi Plateau.