Mars
In addition to Earth, the planet Mars also has polar ice caps. They consist of primarily water-ice with a few percent dust. Frozen carbon dioxide makes up a small permanent portion of the Planum Australe or the South Polar Layered Deposits. In both hemispheres a seasonal carbon dioxide frost deposits in the winter and sublimes during the spring.
Data collected in 2005 from NASA missions to Mars show that the southern residual ice cap undergoes sublimation inter-annually. The most widely accepted explanation is that fluctuations in the planet's orbit are causing the changes.
Read more about this topic: Polar Ice Cap
Famous quotes containing the word mars:
“Venus me yaf my lust, my likerousnesse,
And Mars yaf me my sturdy hardinesse.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“The sword’s a cross; thereon He died:
On breast of Mars the goddess sighed.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“But in the dome of mighty Mars the red,”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)