NASA Gathering Evidence That There’s Water on Mars

This is a picture of a piece of land on Mars, provided by Opportunity, one of the spaceships that went there and explored the field, in search for water

Throughout time, scientists have been trying to prove that there is water on Mars and there is a recent study which suggests that water may have been found on the Red Planet.

NASA scientists have already chosen the new site for their next Mars rover and they want to find some more evidence that there has been water on the planet for a very long time. According to the scientists, there are some signs showing that in certain regions of the planet, there are some spots where water exists. Later this year, the next Mars rover is going to be launched and Curiosity will land in the Gale Crater. This site offers great insight on whether there is water on the Red Planet or not and NASA’s scientists are very hopeful in what concerns their future findings.

Throughout time, NASA’s scientists have gathered some evidence that there are patches of land on Mars which show that there has been water on the planet for a very long time. This evidence consists of patches of carbonates the scientists have found, which usually form in large bodies of water. Now, the scientists suggest that more water can be found under the iron oxide (rust) which covers huge areas of the planet. “It’s possible that an important clue, the presence of carbonates, has largely escaped the notice of investigators trying to learn if liquid water once pooled on the Red Planet,” said Janice Bishop. Bishop went on saying that the possibility of life on Mars is not such an outrageous thing, but that it highly depends on whether liquid water can be found there or not.

What the researchers did was to conduct field experiments in desert regions of the world, in order to analyze some carbonate rocks coated with iron oxides, which can be found in the Mojave Desert. Then, they examined them in the laboratory and what they found was that the varnish had extended for a period of time at some point and that made them think that throughout time, the Red Planet simply dried up. However, if that evidence proves to be true, than the probability to find life on Mars increases greatly.

In what concerns the rusty varnish, it seems that this is so widespread throughout the entire Mars surface that has been explored by now, that scientists had to remove the overcoat at first and only then, could they drill and inspect the area. The overall conclusion of the study is that further research needs to be done, but there are high hopes that the scientists and explorers will find some sort of proof that there is water somewhere on Mars and that may lead to serious thinking to expore the Red Planet more, maybe life will be found somewhere in there.11