Curiosity Views a Fractured Boxwork Pattern Up Close

The curblike ridge in this view is part of a series of crisscrossing features that form what's called a boxwork pattern. NASA's Curiosity Mars rover captured the image with its Mast Camera, or Mastcam, on May 16, 2025, the 4,541st Martian day, or sol, of the mission. This panorama was stitched together from 15 individual images. The color in these images has been adjusted to match the lighting conditions as the human eye would see them on Earth. When viewed from space, the boxwork patterns look a bit like spiderwebs. They have fascinated scientists since before Curiosity's 2012 landing on the Red Planet and are believed to have formed from groundwater trickling through rock cracks billions of years ago. Minerals left behind by the water hardened like cement within the rock; after eons of sandblasting by wind, the rock was carved away, revealing networks of resistant ridges within. https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA26558