Recent Water on Mars

RobertDyck · 2018-02-22 15:06:57

Actually, I think genetically engineered yeast to produce milk is a good idea. As long as it's real.

SpaceNut · 2018-04-21 08:50:25

Ancient Lakes on Mars Dried Up Billions of Years Ago, Study Concludes that the cracks identified on Mars's surface last year by the Curiosity rover are indeed evidence of ancient lakes that likely dried up about 3.5 billion years ago.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technolo … li=BBnb7Kz

Researchers used the Curiosity rover and data from its many tools, particularly the Mars Hand Lens Imager, ChemCam Laser Induced Breakdown Spectrometer (LIBS) and the Alpha-Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) to study both the physical appearance and the chemistry of the rock, which is described as no bigger than a coffee table.
The analysis revealed that cracks on the rocks were formed by exposure to air, rather than heat or the flow of water. In addition, the shape of the cracks suggests the occurrence of a single drying event on the planet, rather than multiple cycles of the planet getting wet and drying over. The position of the cracks, closer to the center of the ancient lake rather than along the edges, also suggests that the lake levels changed often, rising and falling dramatically over time.
"The mudcracks are exciting because they add context to our understanding of this ancient lacustrine system," lead study author Nathaniel Stein, a geologist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, said in a statement, referring to the ancient lake system on the planet.
Scientists have known of the existence of ancient water on Mars for years. A 2015 NASA study that measured water signatures in Mars’ atmosphere suggested that ancient oceans may once have had more water than our own Arctic Ocean. However, because the planet has less gravity and a thinner atmosphere than Earth, this water evaporated into space over the course of several billion years.
Water still exists on Mars in the form of ice. In 2015, NASA scientists found a slab of ice just beneath Mars' surface that was estimated to be as big as California and Texas combined.
Some have even suggested that there may still be liquid water flowing on Mars.

Void · 2018-04-21 14:14:05

Spacenut,

I read my post #1 and your post just before this. Interesting.

I think that their assertion can be taken largely seriously. I do think that for some reason, and they say 3.5 billion years ago, the Martian atmosphere dissipated to the point that planet wide liquid water became unlikely.

They still seem to suggest evaporation to space. Maybe. Still there are those who say that the Mariner rift valley shows evidence of being filled with ice with a thick soil layer over it. I could go on. My point though is while I support the material of your post rather strongly, I don't think we have enough information to prove that that ancient ocean of the Northern hemisphere including the Mariner rift valley did not just freeze over, and is now covered with a very thick layer of regolith.

I did not think that could be possible before, but Utopia planetia apparently is stable, with a layer of ice several hundred feet thick with covered with dirt and rock 3-33 meters thick???

So, I say, I just am not sure.

But I agree that the atmosphere dissipated by some method, either to space or to go underground as clathrate in the ice, if major seas, or wet based glaciers were present prior to the atmospheric collapse.

......

A latest thing I have seen about the moons of Mars, is that they were formed by the impact of a dwarf planet with Mars. This supposedly created several moons, and the largest have already crashed back into Mars.

https://phys.org/news/2016-07-giant-imp … moons.html

Still I think they indicate that it happened very early in the history of Mars, not 3.5 billion years ago. If it was 3.5 billion years ago, I would suppose that the Martian atmosphere would have gotten expelled, by an iron atmosphere around Mars. But then why would Mars have significant water??? So, probably not the answer.

......

I am going to leave it alone other than to agree that the atmosphere dissipated, most likely as they seem to indicate ~3.5 billion years ago.
Not all the water dissipated. In fact it may be that not a huge amount of it left Mars. Or perhaps much did. Without more information I cannot know.

.....

This I have though which could be useful, to argue for a minor occasional role for liquid on Mars, if a special event were to happen. I large impact. And eruption of significance.

Or, the axis of Mars tilting so that the North Pole, South Pole, and Equator receive approximately the same amount of energy from the sun on an annual basis.

This assertion has to do with the freezing point of CO2. If no place on the surface of Mars would be cold enough to permanently capture CO2 as ice, the atmospheric pressure of Mars would rise to an average of 11 mb. This assertion is based on the amount of permanent CO2 ice which is said to be found in the South Polar ice cap of Mars.

At 11 mb, two things can happen that don't much happen now:
1) Snowfalls.
2) Temporary water streams from snow melts.

Temporary streams in Antarctica do not even require temperatures of the air above freezing. If strong sunlight is present such melts happen in Antarctica even when the air temperature is somewhat below freezing.

At the equator of Mars, you might get something similar, but it would be daily perhaps most likely just after noon time.

Temporary streams might fill ponds, or even small lakes. These bodies of water would be ice covered however. The ice would also tend to sublimate at a high rate. However, with dust storms the ice might get covered with a protective layer of dirt, which would buffer the temperatures experienced by the ice below, and reduce the highest temperatures experienced.

So, I am saying that as a whole most likely liquid water stopped occurring in significance on the surface of Mars 3.5 billion years ago as your post seems to state. However I make some exception for periodic and localized events of melting of less significance, and most likely of a temporary nature.

Done.

Last edited by Void (2018-04-21 14:32:24)

Void · 2018-04-21 18:31:09

I have given a somewhat upbeat notion of temporary and local water on Mars in post #53, which I think might happen in an ideal situation of the tilt of the planet, where the Equator, South Pole, and North Pole receive sufficient warming, to prevent large scale CO2 ice to persist.

However I want to say that I think that conversely, if the poles were to be for period of several million years not tilted much at all, then the conditions on the planet might be lethal to life.

That is in that case CO2 freezing in any shadows of craters, or perhaps even just on the polar axis of North and South, might not thaw much at all ever during that period. So, under those conditions, what if the atmospheric pressure of Mars was largely sustained by Nitrogen and Argon. Would it even be say 5% of what it is now? Well even 10%, 25%???

Well under those conditions, it would think that much water moisture in the soil and any presumed aquifers would migrate to the poles as well. The aquifers would become extremely salty, very likely too salty for life, if they are not already now. (This notion of too salty aquifers is one I acquired from Josh in the past).

So, my point is that even microbes on Mars in deep aquifers might be very challenged for survival due to the wandering of the Martian poles.

I think that Mars provides it's own extinction episodes by this method. Mars may have been alive to start with say for 1 billion years, or a little more, but I think it likely that it has had total extinctions repeatedly.

It may have had life restarted several times by panspermia, but I expect that each episode of life was followed by a total or nearly total extinction.

The one exception I might provide would be something very deep down that relies on the production of Hydrogen by radioactive decay. On Earth this is seen in South African mines, maybe 3 miles down.

But that would also require water that is not so briny that life can't make it. Maybe water placed in those deeps before the atmosphere collapses.

But of course I don't know really.

To find it you would really need to go down deep. It would not make sense to do so unless you found fossil evidence of previous life on or near the surface of Mars prior to that effort.

I think Mars is totally or largely dead.

Venus? Actually I think there may be serious chances of life.

SpaceNut · 2019-05-10 19:22:12

omething that I will post about later in the correct topics but want to note it for the calendar as these are special events to make note of..

New water cycle on Mars discovered

Winter to summer seasonal evaporations forming clouds. We also seem to have another seasonal event with dust storms as well.

For InSight Dust Cleanings Will Yield New Science of which they seem to be linked together as Martian Dust Could Help Explain Water Loss Plus Other Learnings From Global Storm

SpaceNut · 2019-05-16 19:09:33

Water and the who, what, where, when how questions that man needs is getting some more thoughts on what is cause the water to go and where.
How the Sun pumps out water from Mars into space

SpaceNut · 2020-01-20 19:27:08

Not good Martian water could disappear faster than expected

When the sun lights up the large reservoirs of ice at the poles, water vapor is released into the atmosphere. These water molecules are then transported by winds toward higher and colder altitudes where, in the presence of dust particles, they can condense into clouds and prevent a rapid and mass progression of water toward higher altitudes (as on Earth). On Mars condensation is often hindered. The atmosphere is thus regularly supersaturated in water vapor, which allows even more water to reach the upper atmosphere, where the sun's UV rays disassociate them into atoms. The discovery of the increased presence of water vapor at very high altitude entails that a greater number of hydrogen and oxygen atoms are able to escape from Mars, amplifying the loss of Martian water over the long term.
An international research team,1 led partly by CNRS researcher Franck Montmessin, has just revealed that water vapour is accumulating in large quantities and unexpected proportions at an altitude of over 80 km in the Martian atmosphere.
Measurements showed that large atmospheric pockets are even in a state of supersaturation, with the atmosphere containing 10 to 100 times more water vapour than its temperature should theoretically allow.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.aay9522

SpaceNut · 2020-01-31 21:37:00

Mars' water was mineral-rich and salty

SpaceNut · 2020-02-16 11:38:50

tahanson43206 wrote:

For Grypd re #61
Your line about underground Aquifers is the inspiration for this post. However, the mention of your long tenure here led me to check out your 1853 posts, or (more accurately) the tip of the long stream of your posts.
http://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php … 303#p40303
This topic and several adjacent to it were interesting to me because of the perspective of the English experience with management of crime.
I came away from a brief visit with those posts thinking that your recommendation is that Mars NOT be used as a penal colony. I found myself in agreement with your recommendation to set up a Canadian Mounties type police force. I noted your recommendation that this force must be designed to resist and foil any attempt by a would-be dictator to take over the force.
However ... to your post!
The possibility of underground Aquifers makes sense to me, but (to my knowledge at this moment) no technology exists that is capable of finding a particular atom or compound in the interior of Mars. If you are aware of technologies that are capable of identifying deposits of water or useful minerals under the surface of an object such as a planet, I'd really appreciate your posting about them in the forum.
For consideration of SpaceNut's efforts to try to direct the flow of posts into somewhat meaningful directions, please find out from SpaceNut where such posts should go.
I am aware of these technologies that might help:
1) Radar (various frequencies)
2) Sonar (probably various frequencies but I'm not sure)
3) Measurement of particles of various kinds
This later technology has the greatest potential for planetary interior discovery, but it also requires the greatest investment.
Neutrinos are (I gather) extremely difficult to work with because of their weak interaction with ordinary matter. However, apparently they CAN be employed to discover facts about matter between their point of origin (eg, the Sun) and the detector.
We on Earth would certainly benefit from discovery of a technology that allowed for precise location of deposits of oil, water, natural gas, minerals of all kinds and specific substances such as Uranium. To my knowledge, such technology only exists in conceptual form in science fiction and Star Trek episodes.
This topic is about solar power towers on Mars, so I'll admit that discussion of technology to investigate the interior of a planet is a stretch.
The link (if there is one) is your introduction of the idea of digging a well << grin >>
In closing ... you still maintain your point-of-origin as Scotland. I would imagine you've noted the arrival of Calliban in the forum. He started out from Scotland, but for political correctness reasons (I'm guessing) he changed to "Northern England". Americans (I believe) have a tendency to associate Scotland with great engineering feats, and with great engineers, so I appreciate your hanging on to your Scottish connection.
(th)

Grypd wrote:

Well the best way to find out was underground is by listening to sound waves as they pass through rock. Through the time and the distortion of sound and of course our knowledge from Earth updated to Martian standards we will learn. We already use radar to look for minerals but also we look using changes in magnetism. We know there are Aquifers possibly of non frozen water as we have seen these leak and leave obvious geological features.
Mars has a metallic core as we understand it and it is hot and a liguid it just does not move so no magnetic field. This means as you tunnel down the rocks will get hotter and we can use this possibly through a stirling engine to provide not only power but as a source of heat for Martian domes. Another means of terraforming is creating very large deep holes so the heat could be released to help heat the planet these are called Moholes https://marsproject.com/mohole.htm
And yes im from Scotland in fact im from the Highlands

knightdepaix · 2020-03-14 09:53:03

About making water, is the following imagination possible and practical:
Abundant of oxygen are available after mining on Mars and the release to human consumption in settlements. About 90% of the cosmic ray bare atoms are protons, stripped of electrons. Could cosmic ray that is supposed to be inbounding to Mars be concentrated on a designated location on Mars, Phobos or Deimos where the ray shoots on processed ore leftover oxides. Then water can be extracted and the element bound by the oxygen can be processed as scrap elements.

tahanson43206 · 2020-03-14 15:31:21

For knightdepais re #60

Bravo for offering a most interesting idea. I am wondering what the abundance of free flying protons might be at the orbit of Mars. The capture of such protons does NOT need to be limited to the immediate vicinity of Mars.

Is there a member of the registered members who can comment (intelligently) on this idea?

If there is a reader who is knowledgeable on this subject, and not yet registered, the process of registration is essentially unfiltered.

One thing you can do to avoid being banned is to post something that is relevant to the overall theme of the forum, and hopefully, to this topic in particular.

(th)

tahanson43206 · 2020-04-03 12:50:04

The link below was forwarded by a relative. It reports on recent research showing what appear to be two different types of water on Mars, and tentative speculation that the origin of the planet may differ significantly from earlier guesses ...

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/30/world/ma … index.html

(th)

SpaceNut · 2020-04-03 16:14:57

The article calls for 35% of what mars did have for water to be underground. Some form of techtonic plates would on earth account for the amount but for mars was the core active long enough for this to happen? Much like Earth Mars got its water in the same manner from natural causes but the unatural events of how fast is where mars is today for none on the surface another than in a mixed ice form at the poles and in deep caverns walls. A tell for the water is in the Hydrogen isotopes that are present.
Getting back to the large quantity beneath the ground is something that radar has said is present but its not clear as to the depth as we are looking at a composite reflection made from however deep the energy went to how it reflected back to the recieving sensor. Do we trust it and blindly go for mars with out a deep sample and if we land with a heavy starship will it support the mass or collaspse.
Water is essential for man to survive and the more energy that we require to manufacture it means that man will have less of a chance to stay.

SpaceNut · 2020-07-10 18:18:03

Distilled versus spring what are we looking for with mineral content

Mars water will need to be processed for drinking and cooking. It will also be a distilled like content from the Sabatier reaction that we will be getting methane from as well.

Starting with what is in our bottled water here on earth.
Huge brand list reports links to pdf documents of testing

https://www.epa.gov/cwa-404/geographic- … termittent

What Is Spring Water and How Is It So Safe?

https://www.samsamwater.com/library/TP4 … apping.pdf

https://www.safewater.org/fact-sheets-1 … tds-and-ph

elderflower · 2020-07-12 05:05:27

Water may be in the form of huge piedmont glaciers from when Mars had a vigorous hydrological cycle, now covered in dust and volcanic ash and thereby preserved. If the cover is thick enough it might even isolate the glacier from overflowing lava. Where lava is inserted under the glacier there would be widespread melting and huge outburst floods and surface collapse. In Iceland such floods are called jokullhlaups (=glacier leaps).
Mars water has a certain percentage of the deuterium isotope and it is from this that the loss of water is calculated. It is possible that the measured concentration of Deuterium (based only on ground surface or atmospheric water) is not representative if there are large ancient ice masses which are effectively isolated (in billion year terms) from the surface. The calculation reference is Earth water, but there is no proof that Earth does not concentrate Deuterium in the depths of the mantle, in preference to light water, which would add further uncertainty to the calculation results.
So with these assumptions the water loss calculation can only be for guidance.

Last edited by elderflower (2020-07-12 05:07:34)

Void · 2020-07-12 10:56:58

We have looked at this before:
https://www.express.co.uk/news/nature/5 … -discovery

I may well be overly optimistic, but I believe that in the last period of a proper troposphere for Mars, you could have had a split personality for Mars. The southern hemisphere would have had something more like the Mars of today, and no real troposphere, and the north would have a challenged troposphere. So, there could have been snow and maybe even rain clouds in the Northern areas, but not so much in the southern areas.

Eventually, even that troposphere would reach a collapse point, and everything would freeze over. If rivers ran, they might bring a concentration of atmosphere into the ice covered body, and while some would bind chemically, I think there could have been a lot of clathrates formed under the ice.

Overly optimistic? Good chances, but that is something that I will take a chance on. The clathrates would likely be very deeply buried under deep sediments.

------

Here, I stick my neck out even further:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/a … 5X13004145

They have not recorded findings of ice there, however by radar, so if it is there it must be very very deeply buried.

This is some reading, that's about all I can say.

https://planetarygeomorphology.wordpres … eris-mars/

Maybe something that could support it is that periodically the ice caps are thought to move towards the equator.
The only other defense I could offer would be that the rift valley may be a giant dust trap, so maybe deep sediments lie over fossil ice.

But again, no radar evidence that I have seen.

Done.

Last edited by Void (2020-07-12 11:22:00)

SpaceNut · 2020-07-12 15:17:40

Large Amounts of Water Ice Found Underground on Mars.

The ice-rich layer is about 60 centimeters (two feet) beneath the surface at 60 degrees south latitude, and gets to within about 30 centimeters (one foot) of the surface at 75 degrees south latitude.

Radar scans of the red planet suggest that a stable reservoir of salty, liquid water measuring some 12 miles across lies nearly a mile beneath the planet’s south pole.

Many models predict that water ice shouldn’t be stable on Mars today, anywhere beyond the poles, no matter how deep you bury it.

First results reveal an almost circular structure, about 250 km in diameter, shallowly buried under the surface of the northern lowlands of the Chryse Planitia region in the mid-latitudes on Mars. The radar investigation shows that south polar region of Mars is made of many layers of ice and dust down to a depth of about 1.5 km in the 200 km-wide area analysed in this study. A particularly bright radar reflection underneath the layered deposits is identified within a 20 km-wide zone. Water detection under the south pole of Mars.

https://www.space.com/30502-mars-giant- … y-mro.html

Mars Ice Deposit Holds as Much Water as Lake Superior

Scientists examined part of Mars' Utopia Planitia region, in the mid-northern latitudes, with the orbiter's ground-penetrating Shallow Radar (SHARAD) instrument. Analyses of data from more than 600 overhead passes with the onboard radar instrument reveal a deposit more extensive in area than the state of New Mexico. The deposit ranges in thickness from about 260 feet (80 meters) to about 560 feet (170 meters), with a composition that's 50 to 85 percent water ice, mixed with dust or larger rocky particles.

https://astrobiology.nasa.gov/news/larg … e-of-mars/

So water is very deep where we would want to be in between the 30' north and south band of the planet. While it gets better for water being not so deep as we get further from the equator and nearer to the poles.

Void · 2020-07-12 18:31:29

I appreciate your contribution as generous.

Some time ago, I thought to think of Mars as a cross between the Earth and a Moon of Jupiter, and that was not a bad bet with what was known.

Still, I think that there is much more to learn. It is not what was expected, really in any era of thinking that I am aware of.

Therefore, the generalist methods probably are proper. Expect to be surprised.

Done.

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-06-30 03:46:11

Gullies on Mars could have been formed by recent periods of liquid meltwater

https://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Gull … r_999.html

Void · 2023-06-30 07:42:19

Mars b4 Moon, that is a very good article: http://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php … 00#p211500

I would like to suggest that for the temporary ice caps which are seasonal, if you have a rock or maybe even bedrock that is seasonally covered with frost, the chance exists that in the spring, the rock gets warm enough in sunlight to host life, from sunlight penetrating the ice. And some pressurization may also occur. For Earth activity for extreme life can begin at -20 degrees C. So, with some salts, and an ambient pressure normal for the surface of Mars, or even elevated by ice pressurization containment, habitable conditions may occur.

Sandstone would be ideal, but even cracks in bedrock or large rocks may be temporarily habitable.

I am not the originator of such ideas. Others have said similar before me.

Done.

It is hard to come by now for some reason but there are some articles if you press hard to find them:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12823188/

https://discoveringantarctica.org.uk/ec … vironment/
Quote:

Endolithic ecosystems
A fascinating and unique feature of the interior is the existence of endolithic ecosystems. As a strategy for avoiding desiccating winds and moderating the temperature and moisture conditions of their living space, cyanobacteria (photosynthesising bacteria), algae, lichens, and fungi have evolved to grow within pore spaces and cracks inside various kinds of rock. They form layers of growth inside the rock near enough to the surface to obtain light for photosynthesis. This is shown in the photograph below which is a rock sample taken from the Dry Valleys area of Victoria Land.

So the key word is "Endolithic".

Search Query: "Endolithic ecosystems on Mars"
General Response: https://www.bing.com/search?q=Endolithi … c0d97cc508

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endolith
Image Quote:
Quote:

Endolith lifeform found inside an Antarctic rock

So, lichen seems to be able to pull water from the air at night at 70% to 100% in some Martian nighttime's, in some Mars simulations.

Temporary ice caps which may contain some water ices and vapors, being composed mostly of transparent CO2 ice, may be protective of life, and at times may even allow motabolism.

But I will leave it at that, as this section is about water not life.

Done.

Last edited by Void (2023-06-30 07:58:12)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-08-22 18:31:58

Spontaneous Capillarity-Driven Droplet Ejection

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1209.3999v1.pdf

the design might also has use for sample collection on Titan and Europa

Capillarity processes through the solar system
https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2021E … C/abstract

Hydrodynamics of electro-capillarity propelled non-Newtonian droplets through micro-confinements
https://link.springer.com/article/10.11 … 22-00196-0

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-09-05 10:26:51

Mars’ Muddy Mystery: Did the Red Planet Once Have Seasonal Weather?

https://scitechdaily.com/mars-muddy-mys … l-weather/

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-10-28 11:35:43

A New Map Shows Where Mars is Hiding all its Ice

https://www.universetoday.com/163937/a- … l-its-ice/

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-11-27 05:02:51

China's Mars rover detects irregular wedges beneath red planet

https://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Chin … t_999.html

SpaceNut · 2023-11-27 08:28:52

This rover is located just north of Persaverence.

The history of water on mars
File:History_of_Water_on_Mars.jpg

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Re: Recent Water on Mars

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#55 2019-05-10 19:22:12

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#56 2019-05-16 19:09:33

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#57 2020-01-20 19:27:08

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Re: Recent Water on Mars

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Re: Recent Water on Mars

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