Gravity of Mars noted that older regions on Mars are isostatically compensated when the younger region are usually only partially compensated. Different volcanic constructs could behave differently in terms of gravity anomalies. Large volcanoes Olympus Mons and the Tharsis Montes produce the largest positive free-air gravity anomalies in the solar system. Alba Patera, also a volcanic rise, north of the Tharsis Montes, however, produces negative Bouguer anomaly, though its extension is similar to that of Olympus Mons. And for the Elysium Mons, its center is found to have slight increase in Bouguer anomalies in an overall broad negative anomaly context in the Elysium
Olympus Mons This inhibition of southeasterly basal spreading in Olympus Mons could account for the structural and topographic asymmetry of the mountain. Numerical models of particle dynamics involving lateral differences in friction along the base of Olympus Mons have been shown to reproduce the volcano's present shape and asymmetry fairly well. It has been speculated that the detachment along the weak layers was aided by the presence of high-pressure water in the sediment pore spaces, which would have interesting astrobiological implications. If water-saturated zones still exist in sediments under the volcano, they would likely have been kept warm by a high geothermal