An amateur astronomer has managed to capture recent images of Mars which appear to show cloud like formations on Mars.

Wayne Jaeschke, from West Chester, Pennsylvania, noticed the formations which can be seen rising up from the edge of the Martian disk after he took the pictures on March 20.

Some observers have suggested the so-called clouds are at least 150 miles away from the surface while others have suggested it could be debris which was disturbed after the Red Planet was hit by a meteor.
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Amateur astrophotographer Wayne Jaeschke captured this picture of the Red Planet from his private observatory in West Chester, Pennsylvania. A 200 per cent enlargement of the formation can be seen at the top of the picture

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The phenomenon has caused a buzz among astronomers who are set to investigate into the cloud-like formation further

Social networking sites have been buzzing with the latest find which has prompted astronomers to investigate further and before they disappear.

'It's not completely unexpected. But it's bigger than we would expect, and it's definitely something that our atmosphere guys want to take a look at,' said Jonathon Hill, a member of the Mars Space Flight Facility at Arizona State University, to Cosmic Log.

A Thermal Emission Imaging System (Themis) on Nasa's Mars Odyssey orbiter will be used to look at the area where the cloud was spotted.

Mr Hill said the Themis camera is capable of getting simultaneous visible and thermal infrared images which would capture the cloud structures and their temperature.

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Themis on Nasa's Mars Odyssey orbiter will be used to look at the area which has the cloud

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The Themis camera is capable of getting simultaneous visible and thermal infrared images

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Astronomers are keen to investigate the phenomenon quite quickly because there have been reports that it is reducing in size
Themis will be looking at the activity on Mars's shield volcanoes and around the southern site, which was spotted by Mr Jaeschke.

Mr Jaeschke, who has a private observatory, said it looked as though the formation had reduced in size but added that it was important to act quickly and investigate the phenomenon.

The feature can be viewed from the Americas and should show up show up on the edge of Mars's disk around 1:10 a.m. ET Saturday, and 39 minutes later each succeeding night.

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The feature can be viewed from the Americas and should show up show up on the edge of Mars' disk around 1:10 a.m. ET Saturday, and 39 minutes later each succeeding night