The image above is of the Valles Marineris, the "Grand Canyon" of Mars, which despite its arid surface appearance, has now been found to have immense water deposits below the surface.
The Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) has detected an area about the size of the Netherlands where water could make up as much as 40 percent of the material near the surface...FREND detected a water-rich region measuring some 41,000 km2 (15,800 square miles). Within the upper 1 m (3.3 ft) of soil, up to 40 percent of the material seems to be water, which the team says most likely exists as ice...“This is very much like Earth’s permafrost regions, where water ice permanently persists under dry soil because of the constant low temperatures.”
Reposted from 2021 to add an update:
"... a new radar survey of the Medusae Fossae Formation region on the Martian equator has revealed what appears to be giant layered slabs of buried water ice, several kilometers thick...There's as much water buried there, scientists say, as can be found in Earth's Red Sea; if it were brought to the surface and melted, it would cover Mars in a shallow ocean between 1.5 to 2.7 meters (4.9 to 8.9 feet) deep...There's no liquid water on Mars now, that we know of. Where all that water went remains a mystery: did it disappear into space as vapor, or is it sequestered inside the planet, locked away where we can't see it? The Medusae Fossae Formation may hold some answers to this question..."
So, not "water" in the form of hydrated minerals, but actual water water, frozen into ice. Fascinating.
Very interesting. Makes me go into sci-fi mode. This is where you start tera-forming!! Appreciate the post!
ReplyDeleteIf there's liquid water, there's life.
ReplyDeleteOr heat, and maybe 'life'.
DeleteA problem may be that the water will likely be tainted with the toxic perchlorate chemicals present in the Martian soil, so would need some serious purification.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.space.com/21554-mars-toxic-perchlorate-chemicals.html
"Anybody who is saying they want to go live on the surface of Mars better think about the interaction of perchlorate with the human body," he warned. "At one-half percent, that's a huge amount. Very small amounts are considered toxic. So you'd better have a plan to deal with the poisons on the surface..."
"Furthermore, seasonal flow features seen on Mars may be caused by high concentrations of the brines of perchlorate, which has a strong attraction to water"
They just need to find a lake of Bourbon and that place might just be habitable.
ReplyDelete