NASA ’s Curiosity rover has found more evidence of a ample and varied history on Mars .
The up-to-the-minute findings were issue in a paper inEarth and Planetary Science Letters . It talk over samples drill from three different locations inside Gale Crater , a basin 154 kilometers ( 96 miles ) wide that once host an ancient lake .
curio is presently seduce its way up Mount Sharp , a 5.5 - kilometer - high ( 3.4 - geographical mile - gamy ) acme in the middle of Gale Crater . And as it does so , it can see deposit dropped at different points in the lake about 3.5 billion years ago . These were described in the paper by scientists from NASA ’s Astromaterials Research and Exploration Science ( ARES ) Division .
" These layer were deposit about 3.5 billion age ago , coincide with a sentence on Earth when life was beginning to take hold , ” NASA ’s Elizabeth Rampe , leash author on the study , state in astatement . “ We consider former Mars may have been standardised to former Earth , and so these environments might have been habitable . ”
What ’s particularly exciting is , as mentioned , the alteration in the samples . It shows that the pH degree and oxygen levels may have varied in the pee – something backed by another paperearlier this month . This suggests differ environments in which microbes could have aim hold .
The sample were take in a part called Pahrump Hills on lower Mount Sharp in 2014 and 2015 . The lowest samples show minerals from a crude magma source . Further up , scientists found tridymite , a puzzling mineral because it organise on Earth from fond melting of our crust – but Mars never had plate tectonics .
Elsewhere , scientists find clay minerals , which usually form in liquid water with near - indifferent pH. These could suggest environments that were worthy for life . Also discover was jarosite , a salt that form in acidulent solutions .
As to why the sample distribution are so varied , well , that is n’t readable . NASA discusses a twain of opening , though . One is that the “ lake water themselves at the stand were oxidizing , so either there was more O in the atmospheric state or other factors encouraged oxidisation . ”
instead , it may be that groundwater moved into the part after the lake . This was more acidulous and oxidizing than the piss before it , giving rising slope to some of the differing features we see today .
Whatever the cause , this study further try out just how varied Mars once was . We are almost certain now that it used to have water supply on its airfoil . Now we just require to find out what it was like to be in that H2O .
