Using Spatial Density to Characterize Volcanic Fields on Mars

Abstract

We introduce a new tool to planetary geology for quantifying the spatial arrangement of vent fields and volcanic provinces using non parametric kernel density estimation. Unlike parametricmethods where spatial density, and thus the spatial arrangement of volcanic vents, is simplified to fit a standard statistical distribution, non parametric methods offer more objective and data driven techniques to characterize volcanic vent fields. This method is applied to Syria Planum volcanic vent catalog data as well as catalog data for a vent field south of Pavonis Mons. The spatial densities are compared to terrestrial volcanic fields.