We're not sure whether it's some kind of Celtic design or perhaps a meth-induced tribal thing, but, to quote the sci guys and gals over at NASA, Mars is "tattooed." That's their cutesy way of bringing attention to what's shown in this high-resolution picture from the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter -- a twisting dark design on the reddish terrain of the planet's surface. It's like Mars went out on a bender and came home all done up in fresh ink and shi...

From a NASA photo today entitled, "Tattooed Mars:" "Newly formed trails like these had presented researchers with a tantalizing mystery but are now known to be the work of miniature wind vortices known to occur on the red planet, in other words Martian dust devils. Such spinning columns of rising air heated by the warm surface are also common in dry and desert areas on planet Earth. Typically lasting only a few minutes, dust devils become visible as they pick up loose red-colored dust leaving the darker and heavier sand beneath intact. Ironically, dust devils have been credited with unexpectedly cleaning the solar panels of the Mars rovers."

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Image: NASA, HiRise, MRO, LPL (U. Arizona)