Some signs of water on Mars may have just dried up.Thanks to the way data from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter are handled, the spacecraft may be seeing signs of hydrated salts that aren’t really there, planetary scientists report online November 9 in Geophysical Research Letters.That lack of salts could mean that certain sites proposed as places where life could exist on Mars today, including purported streaks of liquid water on the walls of Martian craters, are probably dry and lifeless.“People think these environments might be inhabitable by microbes,” says planetary scientist Ellen Leask of Caltech. But “there might not actually be any real evidence for it,” at least not from orbit.Leask and her colleagues found the problem while searching for hydrated salts called perchlorates in maps of Mars taken by the orbiter’s Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars, or CRISM. Perchlorates can lower the freezing point of water by up to … [Read more...] about An orbiter glitch may mean some signs of liquid water on Mars aren’t real
Nasa finds water on mars
Mankind has a 50-50 chance of finding life on Mars within the next three years, Brit scientists claim
HUMANS have a "50/50" chance of finding life on Mars within the next three years, it is claimed. Brit scientists leading trials for a new ExoMars robot believe plans to excavate below the Red Planet's surface dramatically improve the odds. Dr Susanne Schwenzer, the group's astrobiologist, told The Daily Telegraph: "We have a very good chance - we are going to a very, very interesting spot." However, she warned that to find evidence of life was like looking for a needle in a haystack. She added: "We would be of course thrilled if we found DNA - that’s the proof. But that assumes that life on Mars is exactly like life is on Earth, which we don’t know. "If we find life that’s exactly like Earth, we could all be Martians, which is a huge thing in itself. "If life is different from what we have on Earth, that means life can come about very often. "Which means there could be other places in our solar system - icy moons, Europa with an ocean underneath, for example - where … [Read more...] about Mankind has a 50-50 chance of finding life on Mars within the next three years, Brit scientists claim
Water on Mars: Exploration & Evidence
Liquid water may still flow on Mars, but that doesn't mean it's easy to spot. The search for water on the Red Planet has taken more than 15 years to turn up definitive signs that liquid flows on the surface today. In the past, however, rivers and oceans may have covered the land. Where did all of the liquid water go? Why? How much of it still remains? Observations of the Red Planet indicate that rivers and oceans may have been prominent features in its early history. Billions of years ago, Mars was a warm and wet world that could have supported microbial life in some regions. But the planet is smaller than Earth, with less gravity and a thinner atmosphere. Over time, as liquid water evaporated, more and more of it escaped into space, allowing less to fall back to the surface of the planet. Where is the water today? Liquid water appears to flow from some steep, relatively warm slopes on the Martian surface. Features known as recurring slope lineae (RSL) were first identified in … [Read more...] about Water on Mars: Exploration & Evidence
Scientists may have just found a lake of liquid water on Mars
source ESA / Wikimedia Commons Scientists from the National Institute for Astrophysics in Bologna may have found a lake of liquid water on Mars. Satellite data suggests the water might lie underneath the surface of a polar ice cap. The researchers used radar to probe the ice cap, and their new study suggests the potential lake could be 20 kilometers long. We’ve heard it before – there may be a major source of water on Mars, in ice sheets that lie just under the red planet’s. But according to a new study published in the journal Science, liquid water may exist there, too. Researchers from the National Institute for Astrophysics in Bologna in Italy used a radar tool on the European Space Agency’s Mars Express satellite to probe the planet’s ice caps. They believe three years’ worth of data indicates there could be a lake of liquid water under the caps that stretches 20 kilometers across. The team, led by Roberto Orosei, … [Read more...] about Scientists may have just found a lake of liquid water on Mars
Students Build Ice-Drilling Robot To Find Water On Mars
A team from Carnegie Mellon University will compete against nine other institutions June 5-7 at the NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, in an attempt to build and use robots to extract water from simulated Martian subsurface ice. NASA's Mars Ice Challenge is part of an effort by NASA to enable a sustained human presence on other worlds by taking advantage of the habitat's resources. This will be a focus for NASA over the next few decades, and the challenge offers a unique way to engage students and faculty as partners in the efforts to send humans farther into space than ever before. The Tartan Ice Drilling System team comprises 15 students from the College of Engineering. The team is advised by Mechanical Engineering Assistant Professor Aaron Johnson, who shares his expertise in robomechanics. Ph.D. candidate Catherine Pavlov also advises the team, drawing from her research experience at NASA. Five of the students serve as project leads in … [Read more...] about Students Build Ice-Drilling Robot To Find Water On Mars