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These rounded, mysterious mounds occur along the floor of a depression in northern Arabia Terra. The mound surface has many parallel troughs that contain light-toned transverse aeolian (e.g., formed by the wind) ridges oriented perpendicular to the trough walls.

The resolution of this image will help assess the nature and grain size of the sediment that makes up these mounds and whether layering is present, ultimately helping to constrain the environment in which these mounds formed.

This is a stereo pair with ESP_043201_2160.

The University of Arizona, Tucson, operates HiRISE, which was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colo. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington.