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All objects in the universe will seek a configuration of lowest energy. In the case of objects such as planets, which were once in a molten liquid phase, this shape is spherical, or nearly so if rotation is taken into account. Any large-scale divergence from the sphere - such as the Tarsus bulge on Mars - is, therefore, worthy of close investigation.
Terrestrial weather provides a key to understanding meteorological processes which occur elsewhere in the solar system. Today on Mars, thin ground fogs and air-borne cirrus clouds are the only types of water clouds to have been observed. The Martian surface, however, provides ample evidence that a different hydrology/meteorology may have been active in its distant past.
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