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NASA Curiosity rover captures pictures of fields of giant honeycomb on Mars

Image captured by the rover showing the honeycomb shapes in the surface NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

Scientists have never seen such large numbers of many sided fractures in one location

Imagine looking across Mars and discovering the ground was covered in giant honeycomb patterns.

That's exactly what NASA's Curiosity rover discovered as it began climbing a Martian valley nicknamed "Valle Grande".

The mission has spotted small patches of these geometric polygonal (many sided) shapes several times before, but nothing at the scale discovered in Valle Grande.

Made of rock, scientists don't yet know how the patterns were formed.

A selfie captured by NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

The Curiosity rover has been exploring Mars since 2012, helping scientists learn what the Red Planet was like billions of years ago.

The rover sent back 360-degree panoramic images of the polygonal shapes spread in all directions as far as the rover could see.

"We've seen a lot of fascinating landscapes through Curiosity's eyes but this sea of polygons took our breath away," said the mission's project scientist, Ashwin Vasavada of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California.

What do scientists think these shapes could be?

Panoramic image of the shapes in the surface taken by the roverNASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

In a 360-degree panorama the rover sent back images of polygonal shapes spread in all directions for as far as the rover can see

Scientists don't yet know how these honeycomb patterns were formed.

However, some polygons discovered previously on the rovers mission were shown to be "clearly formed as mud cracks.

Researchers are now looking further into this discovery to find the cause.

"We measured their shapes and chemistry carefully and hopeful there are clues in the data as to how these features formed." Ashwin Vasavada said.

This is not the first discovery from Curiosity that's surprised project mission researchers.

The rover landed on Mars in August 2012 and since then has been teaching scientists lots about the planet.