Revealing High‐Manganese Material on Mars at Microscale

Abstract

AbstractHigh‐manganese materials would provide valuable information about the history of a water‐rich and oxidizing environment on early Mars. However, the detailed texture and components of these high‐manganese materials are unknown. In martian breccia meteorite NWA 11220, one unique lithic clast enriched in high‐manganese material (~5 vol%) has been recognized. Here, we report the morphological, micro‐textural, mineralogical, and geochemical features of the martian high‐manganese material at the microscale for the first time. Our results show that (a) high‐manganese materials are characterized by micron‐sized grain (<50 μm), complex associated‐phase (i.e., apatite, enstatite, magnetite, ilmenite, and amorphous matrix), and chemical heterogeneity; (b) nano‐sized (<500 nm) amorphous manganese‐oxide veins or grains are the only manganese‐bearing phases in the high‐manganese materials. These new observations provide new evidence for revealing the geological processes related to the high‐manganese materials on Mars and provide important information for future in‐situ exploration and data interpretation of high‐manganese materials on Mars.