Dhaka, Oct. 7 -- A giant cloud on Mars that has puzzled scientists for years turns out to be even stranger than previously thought -- and explaining it required invoking physics once considered too exotic to occur in nature.

The Arsia Mons Elongated Cloud, or AMEC, was first spotted in 2018 by the European Space Agency's Mars Express spacecraft. Stretching more than 1,800km, it appears each morning over a volcanic region of Mars, grows throughout the day, then fades -- a cycle that repeats over several months each year, reports The Independent.

Scientists had long suspected it was an orographic cloud, the kind that forms when wind flows over a mountain or volcano, as seen on Earth. But attempts to model its formation kept falling short....