Results tagged “Mars”

Mars today has no active volcanism and its atmosphere is oxidizing, dominated by the photochemistry of CO2 and H2O. Using a one-dimensional photochemical model, we consider whether plausible volcanic gas fluxes could have switched the redox-state of the past martian atmosphere to reducing conditions.

The new science results indicate that a large quantity of the Red Planet's water is trapped in its crust rather than having escaped into space.

In a comment published today in Nature Astronomy, Dr. Nathalie Cabrol, Director of the Carl Sagan Center for Research at the SETI Institute, challenges assumptions about the possibility of modern life on Mars held by many in the scientific community.

We humans just landed yet another rover on Mars. As has been the case for decades, each mission to Mars builds upon the successes and failures of those that preceded it. And each mission seeks to ask more profound questions that its predecessors. The Perseverance rover is now unpacking itself and preparing to explore Jezero crater - a mobile astrobiologist in search of evidence that Mars may have once harbored life.

How we got the point where we can send complex droids to Mars was not easy. It all started with people looking through telescopes - often with overactive imaginations. That led to spacecraft barely more sophisticated than a toaster with a shortwave radio which shattered many of those earlier preconceptions. Those early missions blazed a trail of ever increasing complexity and sophistication.

We evaluate what will be the effectiveness of the ExoMars Raman Laser Spectrometer (RLS) to determine the degree of serpentinization of olivine-rich units on Mars.

Reconciling the geology of Mars with models of atmospheric evolution remains a major challenge.

Some microbes on Earth could temporarily survive on the surface of Mars, finds a new study by NASA and German Aerospace Center scientists.

Early Mars is considered as an environment where life could possibly have existed. There was a time in the geological history of Mars when it could have been very similar to Earth and harbored life as we know it.

When the agency's newest rover mission searches for fossilized microscopic life on the Red Planet, how will scientists know whether they've found it?

Both Earth and Mars currently have oxidising atmospheres, which is why iron-rich materials in daily life develop rust (a common name for iron oxide) during the oxidation reaction of iron and oxygen.

It is not yet entirely clear whether Mars began as a warm and wet planet that evolved towards the present-day cold and dry body or if it always was cold and dry with just some sporadic episodes of liquid water on its surface.

A major quest in Mars exploration is hunting for atmospheric gases linked to biological or geological activity, as well as understanding the past and present water inventory of the planet, to determine if Mars could ever have been habitable and if any water reservoirs could be accessible for future human exploration.

An origin of Earth life on Mars would resolve significant inconsistencies between the inferred history of life and Earth's geologic history.

The IBeA research group from the University of the Basque Country's Department of Analytical Chemistry, Faculty of Science and Technology, is participating in NASA's Mars2020 space mission, which is scheduled to touch down on Mars in February this year.

The existence of liquid water within an oxidized environment on early Mars has been inferred by the Mn-rich rocks found during recent explorations on Mars. The oxidized atmosphere implied by the Mn-rich rocks would basically be comprised of CO₂ and H₂O without any reduced greenhouse gases such as H₂ and CH₄.

Mars Sample Return consists of three separate missions, the first of which is the Mars2020 rover which will land at Jezero crater on February 18, 2021. We describe here our remote sensing study of a particular unit that outcrops in Jezero crater that is likely to be part of the return sample suite.

Water on Mars, in the form of brines, may not be as widespread as previously thought, according to a new study by researchers at the Arkansas Center for Space and Planetary Sciences.

Recently, Nadir and Occultation for Mars Discovery (NOMAD) ultraviolet and visible spectrometer instrument on board the European Space Agency's ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) simultaneously measured the limb emission intensities for both [OI] 2972 and 5577 Å (green) emissions in the dayside of Martian upper atmosphere.

The most habitable region for life on Mars would have been up to several miles below its surface, likely due to subsurface melting of thick ice sheets fueled by geothermal heat, a Rutgers-led study concludes.

Solar Proton Events (SPEs) can cause abrupt and significant enhancements to the Martian surface radiation dose.