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Science Forum Index » Miscelaneous » Water 'widespread' on early Mars...
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| Garrison Hilliard... |
 Posted: Sat Jul 19, 2008 10:46 am |
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Water was once widespread on Mars, data from a Nasa spacecraft shows,
raising the prospect that the Red Planet could have supported life.
Researchers found evidence of vast lakes, flowing rivers and deltas on
early Mars, all of which were potential habitats for microbes.
They also discovered that wet conditions probably persisted for a long
time
on the Red Planet.
Details appear in the journals Nature and Nature Geoscience.
One study shows that vast regions of Mars' ancient highlands, which cover
about half the planet, contain clay minerals - which can form only in the
presence of water.
Volcanic lavas buried the clay-rich regions during subsequent, drier
periods of the planet's history, but impact craters later exposed them at
thousands of locations across Mars.
The data comes from the CRISM (Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer
for Mars) instrument on the US space agency's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter
spacecraft.
CRISM works by "reading" over 500 colours in reflected sunlight to detect
particular minerals on the Martian surface - including those that formed
in
the presence of water.
"The big surprise from these new results is how pervasive and long-lasting
Mars' water was, and how diverse the wet environments were," said Crism's
chief scientist Scott Murchie, from the Johns Hopkins University Applied
Physics Laboratory in Maryland.
Cosmic bombardment
The clay minerals, known as phyllosilicates, preserve a record of the
interaction of water with rocks dating back to the Noachian period of
Martian history, which lasted from about 4.6 billion years ago to 3.8
billion years ago.
This was a time in which the Earth, the Moon and Mars were being pummelled
by comets and asteroids.
Rocks of this age have largely been destroyed on Earth by plate tectonics.
They are preserved on the Moon, but were never exposed to liquid water.
So rocks containing phyllosilicates on Mars preserve a unique record of
watery environments in the early Solar System, some of which could have
been stable long enough for life to get started.
Importantly, CRISM detected hydrated silicates - so called because they
contain water in their crystalline structure - within sediments that had
been clearly deposited by water.
The clay minerals were found in fans and deltas within the Holden,
Eberswalde and Jezero craters on Mars.
"In most locations the rocks are lightly altered by liquid water, but in a
few locations they have been so altered that a great deal of water must
have flushed though the rocks and soil," said Jack Mustard, professor of
planetary geology at Brown University in Rhode Island.
"This is really exciting because we're finding dozens of sites where
future
missions can land to understand if Mars was ever habitable and if so, to
look for signs of past life."
Deep and cool
The European and US space agencies have targeted several
phyllosilicate-rich regions as potential landing sites for their next
rover
missions to Mars.
The team also found phyllosilicate deposits in thousands of places in and
around craters, including the pointed peaks located at the centres of some
impact depressions.
This example suggests that water was present 4-5km below the ancient
Martian surface, the researchers said.
Crater-causing collisions are thought to have excavated underground
minerals that were then exposed on the crater peaks.
"Water must have been creating minerals at depth to get the signatures we
see," Professor Mustard explained.
The clay minerals must have been formed at relatively low temperatures.
"What does this mean for habitability? It's very strong," explained
Professor Mustard.
"It wasn't this hot, boiling cauldron. It was a benign, water-rich
environment for a long period of time."
In a separate study published in the journal Nature Geoscience, a team led
by Bethany Ehlmann, from Brown University, analysed sedimentary deposits
in
two deltas within Mars' Jezero crater - which once hosted a body of water
measuring some 40km (25 miles) across.
The deltas suggest a river transported clay minerals into the basin from a
watershed.
"Not only was water active in this region to weather the rocks, but there
was enough of it to run through the beds, transport the clays and run into
the lake and form the delta," said Ms Ehlmann.
She added that the deltas appeared to be excellent candidates for finding
stored organic matter, because the clays brought in from the watershed and
deposited in the lake would have trapped any organisms, leaving a
"cemetery
of microbes".
Nasa will send a robotic rover, Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), to the
planet in September 2009 to look for signs of past or present life.
The European Space Agency (Esa) also plans to send a rover to investigate
Mars' habitability. This mission, called ExoMars, is scheduled to launch
in
2013.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/7511523.stm
Published: 2008/07/17 13:28:15 GMT
MSL LANDING SITE SHORTLIST
Nili Fossae Trough - 25km-wide linear trough with exposed clays and
volcanic deposits
Holden Crater - 150km-wide crater once filled by a lake which experienced
a
massive flood
Mawrth Vallis - Valley with many exposed, clays deposited over a long time
Eberswalde Crater - 65km-wide depression once filled with water and
featuring an ancient delta
Northern Meridiani - Region at equator rich in minerals that typically
form
in presence of water
Miyamoto Crater - Impact depression in Meridiani region with exposed clay
minerals
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