McLaughlin (Martian crater)
McLaughlin Crater is an old crater in the Oxia Palus quadrangle of Mars, located at. It is in diameter and deep. The crater was named after Dean B. McLaughlin, an American astronomer. The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has found evidence that the water came from beneath the surface between 3.7 billion and 4 billion years ago and remained long enough to make carbonate-related clay minerals found in layers. McLaughlin Crater, one of the deepest craters on Mars, contains Mg-Fe clays and carbonates that probably formed in a groundwater-fed alkaline lake. This type of lake could have had a massive biosphere of microscopic organisms.
