Were the northern plains of Mars submerged in a vast flood as recently as 20,000 years ago? Geologists claim to have found evidence of a recent volcanic eruption under the ice cap that could have created a wall of water 200 metres high and 35 kilometres wide.
Signs of volcanic activity and flowing meltwater have been found before, but the new study links the two together with strong geological evidence, bolstering theories that water was the chief sculptor of the huge chasms in the northern martian ice cap. The flood, the researchers say, could have occurred within the past 10 million years and maybe as recently as 20,000 years ago — more evidence that Mars has not been a geological corpse since its wet and warm period billions of years ago.
When water gushed on Mars Nature
Brrr! Mars Colder Than Expected
Peering beneath the ice at the north pole of Mars has now revealed the red planet may be surprisingly colder than was thought.
Any liquid water that might exist on Mars therefore might be hidden deeper than once suspected, closer to that world’s warm heart, researchers suggested.
An international team of scientists used the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter to probe the north pole of the red planet with radar. The ice cap there goes about 1.2 miles deep (2 km) and is roughly the size of Pakistan at 310,000 square miles large (800,000 square km).
These scans revealed the polar cap has up to four layers of ice rich in sand and dust, each separated by clearer sheets of nearly pure ice. Each dirty and clean layer is some 1,000 feet thick (300 meters).
Scars on Mars suggest recent glaciers
A vanished glacier with a mysterious calling card suggests Mars went through many ice ages in its very recent past.
A fresh look at images from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter indicates thick glaciers may have existed in the past 100 million years in the planet’s equatorial region, but vanished after planetary wobbles changed the climate in certain areas.
“We’ve gone from seeing Mars as a dead planet for three-plus billion years to one that has been alive in recent times,” said Jay Dickson, a geologist at Brown University and lead author of the study. “[The finding] has changed our perspective from a planet that has been dry and dead to one that is icy and active.”
Mars Features Resemble Hydrothermal Springs
There’s a growing buzz in the astrobiology community that ancient hydrothermal springs may have been spotted on Mars.
Thanks to the eagle-eyed work of Carlton Allen and Dorothy Oehler of NASA’s Johnson Space Center, “spring-like” mounds have been found in Vernal Crater in Arabia Terra on the red planet.
The high-powered zoom lens of NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has picked up the features – two possible ancient hydrothermal springs are viewed as light-toned, elliptical structures.
The martian features have a striking similarity to spring mounds here on Earth, such as those in Dalhousie, Australia.
Curious Clouds Seen at Mars
With its thin atmosphere and scant moisture, Mars is often largely cloud-free. But new observations reveal clouds of dry ice thick enough to cast significant shadows on the red planet.
Dust storms are known to shroud vast swaths of Mars. Clouds have been photographed from the ground before, too.
The new research finds that carbon dioxide, the main component of martian air, freezes into clouds so dense they dim the sun by about 40 percent. Frozen carbon dioxide is commonly called dry ice here on Earth.
Fire and Brimstone Helped Form Mars Oceans
The longstanding mystery of how oceans once formed on Mars could be solved by fire and brimstone.
Specifically, researchers now suggest that ancient volcanoes could have released brimstone — now more commonly known as sulfur — that warmed up the red planet enough for liquid water oceans in the early days of Mars. These findings might also shed insight on the young Earth, including the origins of life, scientists added.
Mars Melt Hints at Solar, Not Human, Cause for Warming, Scientist Says National Geographic News
Simultaneous warming on Earth and Mars suggests that our planet’s recent climate changes have a natural—and not a human-induced—cause, according to one scientist’s controversial theory.
Earth is currently experiencing rapid warming, which the vast majority of climate scientists says is due to humans pumping huge amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Mars, too, appears to be enjoying more mild and balmy temperatures.
In 2005 data from NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor and Odyssey missions revealed that the carbon dioxide “ice caps” near Mars’s south pole had been diminishing for three summers in a row. Habibullo Abdussamatov, head of space research at St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory in Russia, says the Mars data is evidence that the current global warming on Earth is being caused by changes in the sun.
“The long-term increase in solar irradiance is heating both Earth and Mars,” he said.
Strange Shapes Seen on Mars
NASA scientists have discovered what might form some of the weirdest landscapes on Mars, winding channels carved into the Martian surface that scientists have dubbed “spiders,” “lace” and “lizard skin.”
The unusual landscape features form in an area of Mars’ south pole called cryptic terrain because it once defied explanation.
But new observations from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, presented here today at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union, bolster theories that the intricate patterns may be sculpted by springtime outbursts of carbon dioxide gas from underneath the frozen-carbon dioxide polar ice cap.
Mars Clouds Drier Than Thought
Clouds over Mars contain less water than previously thought, according to new research using simulated clouds in a lab here on Earth.
The clouds under study are made of water ice, like some clouds on Earth, said Tony Colaprete of NASA’s Ames Research Center.
“However, they are forming at very cold temperatures, often below minus 100 degrees Celsius (minus 212 degrees Fahrenheit),” Colaprete said “What we have found in our laboratory studies is that it is much harder to initiate cloud formation at these cloud temperatures than what we thought.”
Martian Sand Dunes Are Slowpokes
The sand dunes of Mars are in no rush to move across the red planet’s surface, new research shows.
It can take up to 1,000 years for dunes to move just a few meters on Mars, largely due to the planet’s apparent lack of moving surface water, weak winds and thin atmosphere, said the study’s author Eric Parteli.
“Mars dunes move much slower than Earth’s dunes,” said Parteli, a researcher at the University if Stuttgart in Germany, in an e-mail interview.
Parteli and colleague Hans Hermann, of Brazil’s Federal University of Ceará, used computer simulations to reproduce actual Martian dunes observed by the Mars Orbiter Camera aboard NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft. The images were taken before Mars Global Surveyor went silent last year, ending its 10-year study of the red planet’s surface.