Mars Has a Warm Region Inside

What happened

Something deep inside Mars has scientists looking for clues to its internal evolution. A team at the University of Arizona led by Alexander Byrne, used a technique called "tidal tomography" to probe a heat anomaly in the southern hemisphere mantle.

It turns out this subsurface region measures about 200 to 400 degrees Celsius warmer than the rest of the mantle. Mars Has a Warm Region Inside By Carolyn Collins Petersen - September 28, 2026 05:58 PM UTC | Planetary Science Something deep inside Mars has scientists looking for clues to its internal evolution.

A team at the University of Arizona and Brown University, led by Alexander Byrne, used a technique called "tidal tomography" to probe a heat anomaly in the southern hemisphere mantle. The hot spot shows up in tracking data from the Mars Global Surveyor, Mars Odyssey, and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter taken over a period of 16 years.

What the data show are the effects of seasonal tidal forcing as Mars orbits the Sun. "As Mars travels around the Sun, the Sun’s gravity gently stretches and squeezes the planet," said Wagner. Temporal variations in gravitational changes indicate some kind of thermal anomaly within Mars's mantle under the southern highlands of the planet.