Public domain
A World of Snowy Dunes
From the collection of NASA Image and Video Library. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
It is spring in the Northern hemisphere when NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took this image. Over the winter, snow and ice have inexorably covered the dunes. Unlike on Earth, this snow and ice is carbon dioxide, better known to us as dry ice. When the sun starts shining on it in the spring, the ice on the smooth surface of the dune cracks and escaping gas carries dark sand out from the dune below, often creating beautiful patterns.
NASA Image and Video Library’s own descriptionCredit lineA World of Snowy Dunes. NASA/JPL, 2017-08-21. Public domain. ID: PIA21882.
