Water on Mars?

[LittleBoyLost]

From the BBC news:

Water-ice has been found in vast quantities just below the surface across great swathes of the planet Mars.

Ice shows up blue on the gamma-ray spectrometer
The finding by the American space agency (Nasa) is undoubtedly one of the most important made about the Red Planet.

It solves one of its deepest mysteries, points the way for manned exploration and reignites the question of whether life may exist on the planet.

Insiders suggest that, partly as a result of this finding, Nasa may now commit itself to a manned landing within 20 years.

Where the water went

The US space agency will make the dramatic announcement about the water-ice next Thursday. And full disclosure of the findings will come in the journal Science later that day.

The discovery was made by the Mars Odyssey spacecraft, which has been gathering data since late last year.

Mars water facts
Ice crystals less than one metre (three feet) below Mars surface

Located south of 60 degrees latitude

Melted, would create planet-wide ocean

It confirms early observations that also pointed to enormous reservoirs of ice just below the surface.

This finding will answer a question that has puzzled Mars researchers for decades: many lines of evidence suggest that the Red Planet was water-rich in the past, so where did all that water go?

The answer appears to be that it is in the regolith - the layer of loose rock and dust on the surface.

Mars Odyssey has been returning high-quality data about Mars' surface composition.

The spacecraft contains an instrument called a gamma-ray spectrometer that looks for gamma-rays (high-energy light) with a specific signature showing that they come from hydrogen less than one metre (three feet) beneath the Martian surface.

Astronomers believe that the hydrogen is locked up in crystals of ice.

Moon discovery

The same design of instrument was used on the Lunar Prospector spacecraft that discovered ice in the shadowed regions of the Moon's poles in 1998.

Also on board Mars Odyssey is a neutron spectrometer that registers evidence for underground ice in the same regions of the planet.

Researchers were amazed at the strength of the signal of the ice. They had expected to take a year to gather enough evidence but managed to do so in just a few weeks.

They announced preliminary findings in March but now have good data confirming large amounts of the water-ice just beneath the surface south of 60 degrees latitude.

Researchers suspect the same to be true of the northern hemisphere, but cannot make the appropriate observations until later this year due to the Martian winter in the north.

Nasa scientists were scheduled to hold a major news conference on Thursday when they would say that their earlier findings had been confirmed and extended. But this may be brought forward after a British newspaper leaked the news.

Look for life

The dramatic discovery may also guide the selection of future landing and exploration sites on Mars, and may suggest areas to look for evidence of past life.

The presence of such a vast amount of ice - if it were to melt it would drench the planet - will change profoundly the direction of future exploration.


The discovery may indicate areas on Mars where scientists can search for life forms
Although landing probes are planned - the European Beagle 2 and Nasa's twin Mars rovers next year - neither are targeted at the region where the ice may exist.

The Mars Polar Lander was to touch down in exactly the right spot in 1999 and would have undoubtedly detected the ice had it not malfunctioned on the way down.

Having water just below the surface will be an enormous boon to astronauts on Mars.

Water is essential for life, so the discovery enhances the belief that Mars could have had life in the past and perhaps in the present as well.

A fascinating discovery I must say. The next may be even more so.

 

[Blindgroping]

It's only there if you peed on it.

 

[Sarek]

Run and get a sample.

Don't hurry back on our account......

 

[Mentalist]

Mars most likley does have life on it. Nothing more advanced than bacteria but that's not the point. observe:

An examination of a meteorite found in Antarctica and believed to be from Mars shows: 1) hydrocarbons which are the same as breakdown products of dead micro-organisms on Earth, 2) mineral phases consistent with by-products of bacterial activity, and 3) tiny carbonate globules which may be microfossils of the primitive bacteria, all within a few hundred-thousandths of an inch of each other.


Water on Mars has been known about for years, there is a frozen lake on the surface of Mars.

Such an amount of frozen ice beneath the surface is an important discovery, Terraforming Mars is actually a real possibility at some point in the latter half of the next century.

 

[Heathen]

that's no news really, hasn't anyone noticed the polar ice caps? tons and tons of ice up there.

I doubt any living thing can exist on mars, it's far too cold, the atmosphere is way too thin, and the soil is practically dead.

 

[Mentalist]

Not now perhaps but I think the bacterial evidence is pretty strong. It shows that the utopia we call Earth isn't the only place capable of creating the building blocks of life. And if we can see evidence of this on Mars then we have to conclude that there is a high percentage of the billions if not trillions of planets that are able to support life in varying degrees.

 

[Heathen]

Not now perhaps but I think the bacterial evidence is pretty strong. It shows that the utopia we call Earth isn't the only place capable of creating the building blocks of life. And if we can see evidence of this on Mars then we have to conclude that there is a high percentage of the billions if not trillions of planets that are able to support life in varying degrees.

this is true.

Terraforming Mars is actually a real possibility at some point in the latter half of the next century.

this is not true.

 

[starguard]

Bami the Swami says:

I've met several little green men from Mars. I see them everytime I hit my bong. They all confided in me that the only signs of life that exist there are some boots that were owned by Elvis, a Bruce Lee poster, and some leftover happy meal boxes that were left there by Hippies that went there to avoid the draft during Vietnam.

 

[jack]

The trick here is, Earth happens to be in the right place at the right time, and in the scope of the universe, that's a pretty good dice roll, considering.

It's all about the balance. Like Mars, a little farther out and we go cold, unsustainable. A little closer and it gets too hot and cloudy, like Venus or worse, like Mercury.

Orbit is a funny thing. The excentrifugual decay exists, yet orbit is falling exactly into the curve of the planet you are circling. Orbit is also funny in the sense that moons dont spin on their axis to the planet they are orbiting around, but spin on the arc of the circle they are part of.

The question might be better put, "does sentient life exist on Mars?" because it's clear that "life" does.

 

[starguard]

It's all about the balance. Like Mars, a little farther out and we go cold, unsustainable. A little closer and it gets too hot and cloudy, like Venus or worse, like Mercury.

I thought that in accordance to the Green House effect on Venus, its surface was actually hotter than the surface of mercury, and is supposedly gettin hotter all the time

 

[Name Pending]

Bump

 

[Buttmunkey]

my balls, your chin, waddya say?

 

[Mystic Star]

Speaking of Mars, I remember the last time Caitriona gave me a rim job. I was filling up with gas at a Shell station in Tupelo, Mississippi and went into the mens room to take a dump. Well I'll be damned if Caitriona hadn't drilled a hole in the stall to set up her own glory hole booth. Damned enterprising, if you ask me. Anyway, I didn't have the 28 cents with me so I had to decline her offer of a quick BJ. When I went to wipe - you guessed it, no toilet paper. Well, I kinda felt bad about declining the blow job so I offered her DOUBLE -- 56 CENTS if she could clean my rectal area up with her tongue. Well, of course she accepted my generous offer and was almost finished when the chili-cheese dog I had earlier caught up with me unexpectedly. Well, shit flew out of me with about 500 lbs per square inch of force, breaking her nose and dislodging 3 of her 7 teeth. But, like a professional, she handled it like a champ, finished the job, then escorted me to my car so I could get the 58 cents from car. I offered her an even dollar but she said a deal was a deal. What a gal.

 

[Roadwarrior]

Flagg gives better blow jobs plus he swallows. No mess to clean up