This feature on the Martian surface looks a bit like a bear face. What is it really? There is a hill with a V-shaped camber (nose), two craters (eyes) and a circular fault pattern (head). The circular pattern of cracks may be the result of the deposition of sediments on a buried impact crater. Maybe the nose is a volcanic or muddy vent and the deposits are lava or mudflow?

The image was captured by the High Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (HIRISE), a large and powerful camera on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).

HiRISE has photographed hundreds of targeted areas of the Martian surface in unprecedented detail. Its camera operates in the same visible wavelength range as the human eye, but with a telescopic lens that produces images of unprecedented resolution for planetary exploration missions. With these high-resolution images, scientists can distinguish objects as small as 1 meter (about 3 feet) on Mars and study morphology (surface structure) more fully than ever before.

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is a spacecraft sent by NASA to Mars to study the planet’s surface and atmosphere. It was launched in 2005 and has been orbiting Mars since 2006. MRO provided high-resolution images of the Martian surface and made several key discoveries about the planet, including evidence of liquid water.