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There was a remote time in which Mars, today desert, had rivers and seas. We know some of the remnants that have remained, such as the Jezero river delta that explores the Rover Perseverance But that water may have been more than mere traces. A lot more.
New tests. A geological study conducted thanks to the propagation of seismic waves on the red planet has obtained new evidence of the existence of water on Mars. Although the study itself does not imply a definitive test, it joins the list of studies that indicate that the neighboring planet is not as dry as it seems.
A wet past. The Martian oceans had a short duration In geological terms. According to estimates, these would have disappeared between 4,100 and 3,000 million years ago (our solar system has about 4.6 billion years), in periods called Noeic and Hesperic.
The lower gravitational attraction and the lack of a magnetic field that protect the Martian seas of the solar wind left Mars without superficial oceans. But from that water there was more than a handful of marks in the geography of the red planet: the water in solid state lasts ice -shaped either Integrated into its minerals.
The enigma of the missing water. Some researchers detected a problem, and it is the difficulty that the sum of evaporated water, frozen or embedded in minerals could represent the total water that was once on Mars, they explain In an article for The conversation Hrvoje Tkalčić and Weijia Sun, co -authors of the recent geological study on water on Mars.
Insight, to the rescue. In his recent study, the team took advantage of the data captured by the seismometer that the probe Insight He kept operating on Mars during his activity. During this period, Mars suffered an earthquake and received the impact of several meteorites, events whose seismic waves were recorded by the instrument aboard the now deceased probe.
Studying the spread of these leads, the team identified an “anomaly” in a layer of the Martian subsoil located between 5.4 and 8 kilometers under the surface. It is a “low speed layer” that, according to the hypothesis proposed by the equipment would correspond to a layer of porous rock stuffed with water, “like a saturated sponge” or “something similar to the aquifers of the earth.”
A lot of water. This layer could hide a significant amount of water, enough to house the water that dfalta in the accounts of the experts. “We have calculated that the ‘aquífera’ in Mars could house enough water to cover the planet in a global ocean of a depth of between 520 and 780 m, several times more water that keeps the Antarctic ice layer.”
The details of the study will be published In an article In the magazine National Science Reviewbut for now we have to settle for a draft.
Tests accumulate. This It is not the first time that we get evidence of the existence of vast amounts of water in the Martian subsoil. A little over a year agoa study conducted from the data of the European probe Mars Express reached a similar conclusion, that of the existence of huge amounts of water, enough to create an ocean of several hundred meters deep, in the Martian subsoil.
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