The Europlanet Science Congress (EPSC) is the largest planetary science meeting in Europe, bringing together the space exploration community every year. This year's EPSC2024 took place from 8-13 September at Freie University in Berlin and attracted 1,200 participants from around the world.

During the event, a representative of the Polish Geological Institute – National Research Institute, Bartosz Pieterek, PhD, from the Laboratory of Micro-Earth Analyses, presented a paper entitled 'Neotectonic activity at the Claritas Rupes scarp, Thaumasia region, Mars'.

The aim of Europlanet Science Congress 2024 was to discuss a wide range of scientific topics related to planetary science and planetary missions. The conference offered a wide range of lectures, workshops and poster sessions, while providing a unique opportunity to network and share experiences.

The EPSC2024 Congress covered the full spectrum of planetary exploration and space technology in more than 60 scientific sessions, with topics including current and upcoming missions, drone use, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning in planetary science and planetary defence. The programme was complemented by plenary lectures, debates and community events.

PhD Bartosz Pieterek's presentation opened the session entitled 'Planetary volcanism, tectonics, and seismicity' and presented the latest research results on Mars tectonic activity, which were published in the international journal Icarus (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2024.116198).

Based on high-resolution images taken by the HiRISE camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, an international team of scientists led by Bartosz Pieterek, PhD, has explored the south-eastern part of Tharsis, in an area called Claritas Fossae. This region is dominated by the topographic escarpment Claritas Rupes, which is several hundred kilometres long and up to 2 kilometres high. On the slope of this huge tectonic formation, which was formed more than 3 billion years ago, scientists have discovered a group of much smaller escarpments hundreds of metres long and with a maximum height of a few metres. These show a spatial relationship with modern rock slides, indicating the presence of relatively young tectonic activity in the study area. As this study shows, many areas on Mars have an interesting geological history that is still waiting to be discovered.

3D visualisation of the Claritas Fossae escarpment in the southern part of Tharsis, which features the described scarp recording young tectonic activity. A black and white HiRISE image illustrates the relationship between the escarpments and the boulders falling down the main Claritas Rupes escarpment

Poster session held in the lobby of the congress centre of the Freie University in Berlin

Post-conference materials, including abstracts and recordings of speeches, are available on the website: https://www.epsc2024.eu/

Text and photo: Bartosz Pieterek