The Impact of Data Resolution on Planetary Compressional Structure Analysis

Abstract

Planetary studies of compressional structures are fundamental for understanding the tectonics and thermal evolution of planetary bodies. Compressional features are commonly characterized by their morphology, which in turn is strongly dependent on the spatial resolution of topographic data. Low‐resolution data may lose important morphological characteristics that are directly linked to their structural architecture. Although the influence of data resolution in the analysis of surface structures is widely recognized, a systematic and comparative quantification of shortening over‐ or underestimation across different morphologies and resolutions is still lacking, and the amount of these deviations remains quantitatively poorly constrained. In this work, I assess the effect of data resolution on the morphological and structural analysis of five compressional ridges with different sizes and geometries on Mars using four digital elevation models with different resolutions: Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (∼463 m/px), High‐Resolution Stereo Camera (∼75–∼100 m/px), CTX (∼6 m/px), and HiRISE (∼0.3 m/px). Additional applications to one example on Venus and one on Mercury are used to evaluate transferability to other planetary bodies. The results quantitatively demonstrate how morphological characterization and structural analysis can be affected by significant local deviations depending on the size of the analyzed structures and the type of topographic data. By applying a harmonic index to ridge width and relief on Mars, I identify a threshold range of approximately ∼175–275 m. Below it, low‐resolution data become unreliable, whereas above it, they can provide an overall reliable characterization. Based on the current available data sets, this threshold appears valid on Mars and potentially on Venus, but apparently not on Mercury.