A number of puzzling geographic formations recently found on Mars include one that looks like a deformed waffle.

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) satellite captured images of this "enigmatic landform". Located in the Athabasca region of Mars, the object is 1.2 miles wide and circular in shape. The region is said to be home to the planet's youngest lava flows.

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The HiRISE camera onboard MRO spotted this weird geographical anomaly consisting of a flat landscape with a curious circular mound. HiRISE has a fairly good resolution and was able to take photos of that feature at around one foot per pixel.

The waffle-like structure is around 1.2 miles across and situated in the middle of smooth, long-cooled lava flows. Scientists believe it could be a product of lava flowing beneath an ice mound that was pushed up and then rapidly cooled.

HiRISE has the largest aperture (19.7 inch) reflecting telescope ever fitted to any satellite. The instrument weighs 65 kilograms and was built by Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corporation. It cost US$40 million.

"Perhaps lava has intruded underneath this mound and pushed it up from beneath. It looks as if material is missing from the mound, so it is also possible that there was a significant amount of ice in the mound," the NASA team said.

The newly found circular area may be solid evidence that Mars has volcanoes. NASA experts said volcanism could have been an important part of the process that formed the deformed waffle structure.

TagsMars, red planet, NASA, HiRISE camera, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, lava form in Mars, volcanoes in Mars, space exploration, solar system