The changing appearance of gullies on Mars over the last seven years suggests that liquid water flowed recently on the red planet and may still seep out in brief bursts, researchers said Wednesday.
In what is billed as “the squirting gun,” new images of known gullies on Mars show evidence of new flows and deposits, pointing to explosive events in which some form of water burst from crater walls and ran down their slopes.
“We’ve had this story of ancient water on Mars,” said researcher Kenneth Edgett, who participated in the Mars gully study, during a press briefing at NASA’s Washington, D.C. headquarters. “Today we’re talking about liquid water that is present on Mars right now.”
December 6th, 2006
Changing Mars Gullies Hint at Recent Flowing Water
December 6th, 2006
Recent Water Gushes and Craters on Mars
Evidence of Mars gushers and craters sometime in the past five years! Dr. Michael Malin of Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego stated, “We think that the water is coming from deep in the ground. It’s warmed as it gets closer to the center of Mars. The outer parts of Mars are really, really quite cold, but the inner part is probably still warm, just as the Earth’s interior is warm. As the water came up, it reached the surface and initially froze at the surface. But as more and more water came up, it would build pressure behind the frozen water in front of it and eventually it would break out of behind that barrier and flow down the surface. So we think there’s an ice dam that is holding back water for some period of time, and then that dam breaks, and water comes out, and as it comes out, and as the dam breaks, it consists of rock debris from the rock around that water, it includes ice fragments from the dam and it includes liquid water. And it flows down these very steep slopes, 20, 30 degree slopes and picks up rock debris and spreads out and forms the deposit that we see. So what we think is that there’s a trickle of water initially just sort of building up pressure behind the ice dam, and then eventually there’s a rapid release of many thousands of cubic meters of water that comes out, like swimming pools amounts of waters come rushing out of the ground in a very short, brief event and then the surface refreezes, and then more water builds up time and pressure and then eventually breaks again.”
October 28th, 2006
Soil minerals point to planet-wide ocean on Mars New Scientist
An ocean of water once wrapped around Mars, suggests the discovery of soil chemicals by NASA’s rovers. But the same chemicals also indicate that life was not widespread on the planet at the time the ocean was present.
Sulphates, which form most readily in liquid water, had already been detected by the Spirit and Opportunity rovers. The minerals have been interpreted as evidence for past bodies of water on the surface. But it has not been clear how large these bodies of water might have been.
Now, a new analysis of rover data suggests that the sulphates were once dissolved in a planet-wide ocean. The study was carried out by James Greenwood of Wesleyan University and Ruth Blake of Yale University, both in Connecticut, US.
August 28th, 2006
Mars Clouds Higher Than Any On Earth
Mars is home to the highest clouds ever discovered above the surface of a planet, astronomers said today.
The European Space Agency’s orbiting Mars Express spacecraft found clouds that are between 50 and 62 miles (80 to 100 kilometers) above the red planet.
The highest clouds on Earth top out at about 52 miles (84 kilometers).
The surprising clouds are most likely made of carbon dioxide, researchers said. There were detected with a camera that senses ultraviolet and infrared light, so there is no conventional picture of them.
The clouds were spotted by observing distant stars just before they disappeared behind Mars. The stars would dim as they went behind clouds.
August 16th, 2006
Roaring Jets of Carbon Dioxide Solve Mars Mystery
Peculiar spots, fan-like markings, and spider-shaped features on Mars’ southern ice cap are seasonal formations, researchers announced today. The shapes are formed by thin layers of dark dusty material that are sprayed by roaring jets of carbon dioxide that erupt through the ice cap. This dusty material may also be the reason that the southern ice cap doesn’t reflect much light. The mystery markings, generally 50 to 150 feet wide, appear every southern spring as the Sun rises over the red planet’s ice cap. They last about three to four months.
April 21st, 2006
Wet era on Mars ended more than 3 billion years ago CBC
If Mars ever supported life, it was likely early on in its history when it was wet, say scientists who’ve made a timeline of the planet’s geological evolution. The planet had three geological eras, the team of French, American, Italian, Russian and German scientists report in Friday’s issue of the journal Science.
April 21st, 2006
Climate shift dried out Mars, study says
Warm, wet conditions that made Mars possibly suitable for life were wiped away by a sweeping climate shift marked by fierce volcano activity and other upheavals, an international science team reported Thursday — billions of years after the fact.
March 14th, 2006
Google launches new look at Mars
First there was Google Earth, then Google Moon.
On Monday, Google Inc. expanded its galactic reach by launching Google Mars, a Web browser-based mapping tool that gives users an up-close, interactive view of the Red Planet with the click of a mouse.
The Martian maps were made from images taken by NASA’s orbiting Mars Odyssey and Mars Global Surveyor.
January 19th, 2006
Mountains of Mars ‘were once covered with snow’ The Times of London
Large areas of the Red Planet were once turned white by heavy snowfalls that were common on Mars several million years ago, scientists say.
A new model of the ancient Martian climate has revealed that the glacial deposits of the planet
December 13th, 2005
Thousands of Auroras on Mars Universe Today
On Earth we have the Northern and Southern Lights, and there’s a similar phenomenon on Mars too. But instead of sticking to the planet’s poles, these faint auroras can show up anywhere on the planet; wherever there are patches of strong magnetic fields. Over the past six years, NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor has turned up 13,000 aurora events on the Red Planet, and mapped their locations. These mini magnetic fields can potentially protect the planet’s surface from the Sun’s solar wind.