NASA is, obviously, not the only space agency in the world. Nor are they the only agency doing really cool work at Mars. The European Space Agency is currently operating the Mars Express, in orbit around the Red Planet, and the produce of that mission is absolutely astounding.
The latest update from the Mars Express team focuses on Amenthes Planum:
ESA’s Mars Express took a high-resolution stereo image on 13 January of the southeast corner of the Amenthes Planum region on Mars, near to Palos crater and the mouth of a well-known sinuous valley, Tinto Vallis.
At the bottom-centre of the full-colour image … is a nearby shorter and wider valley, which is fed by a number of tributaries before it joins the mouth of Tinto Vallis as both empty into Palos crater, just off the bottom of the image.
The 190 km-long Tinto Vallis is seen in the context image and is named after the famous Rio Tinto river in the Andalucía region of Spain. It is believed to have formed around 3.7 billion years ago, during the early history of Mars.
The network of shorter valleys shown in the first perspective image is thought to have formed through volcanic activity melting subsurface ice and liberating water to the martian surface via seeps and springs.
novus advocatus scientiae 