Mars may have kept a warm interior beneath its southern highlands. A new Nature study used tiny, seasonal changes in Mars's gravity field—read through the tracking of three orbiters—to infer a 200–400 °C thermal contrast between the southern and northern mantle. The result may help connect Mars's uneven crust to clues about ancient water, magnetism, and seismic waves. The cause of the heat difference remains unsettled.
Sources: Nature paper · MEDIA INAF explainer
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