Santorini, Greece. Credit: Dimitra Damian/Greek ReporterScientists have recently discovered that rocks collected on Greece’s Santorini have an eerie resemblance to those on Mars.
Along with being one of the most popular tourist destinations in the entire Mediterranean, the Greek island of Santorini has become an excellent destination for comparative planet studies.
Many would be surprised to learn that the island is the result of a complex history of volcanic eruptions over the span of approximately two million years, during which the island’s physical characteristics were in a constant state of change.
In 1646 BC, a massive volcanic eruption, perhaps one of the largest ever witnessed by human beings, took place at Thera. The cataclysmic explosion was estimated to have a force equivalent to forty atomic bombs.
Rocks in Santorini are similar to those identified by rovers on Mars
Ioannis Baziotis, a researcher at the Agricultural University of Athens and co-author of the study, recently published in Icarus and explained that “In Balos Cove, located to the south of the island, we have discovered basalts such as those that have been identified by the rovers on Mars and with properties similar to those of certain meteorites from the red planet and those of terrestrial rocks classified as Martian analogues.”
