Mars caves — lava tubes, pits, and other Martian subsurface voids — are radiation-shielded environments of high astrobiological interest. They preserve volatiles, shelter potential biosignatures from cosmic-ray flux, and offer candidate habitats for both microbial life and future human missions.
At abscicon26 (src-abscicon26-media-tips-2-2026-05) the topic anchored multiple sessions:
- roger-wiens (Purdue) proposed a heli-drone concept to explore Mars lava-tube caves.
- jennifer-blank (NASA Ames/BAERI) led a session on robots specifically designed to spelunk Mars caves for biosignatures.
- A dedicated session, “Planetary Caves and Voids as Targets for Astrobiology Science I,” anchored the cluster.
Volcanic Vents as Targets
connor-bunn and pascal-lee (seti-institute) argue volcanic vents are superior astrobiology targets compared to lava-tube skylights because vents provide sustained heat and volatile circulation including water vapor. Their Orpheus hopper mission proposal targets Cerberus Fossae, including “Vent #5” on Cerberus Tholus 1, which features a 400-meter dark streak of potentially fresh volcanic material (src-orpheus-mars-volcanic-hopper-2026-04).