Frozen sea found on Mars, researchers say

Follow-up studies needed, but scientists hopeful about possibility of life

Space.com

The square in this map of the Elysium region of Mars shows the area where large blocks of water ice are believed to be detected.

By Robert Roy Britt

updated 7:17 p.m. ET Feb. 22, 2005

WASHINGTON - A European space probe has found evidence for large blocks of water ice just beneath the Martian surface in relatively warm conditions near the equator.

The frozen sea of sorts, if follow-up studies confirm it, would be the first large quantity of water ice on Mars confirmed to exist near the equator, researchers say. And it would be a good place to search for present life.

"This is a historic moment for Mars exploration when a previously neglected region reveals its secrets," Jan-Peter Muller of the University College London said in a statement today. "Speculations that this area might have water close to the surface have been shown to be correct."

Story continues below ↓

advertisement | your ad here

The findings could be important for biology, Muller and his colleagues say.

"Higher levels of methane over the same area mean that primitive micro-organisms might survive on Mars today," the statement reads.

Small quantities of methane were previously detected in the Martian atmosphere by the European Space Agency's Mars Express orbiter. Methane could be a byproduct of biological activity, or it could be the result of nonbiological processes, other scientists say. And the methane signature at Mars is tentative for now, researchers have said.

"The methane signature is controversial," Brown University geologist John Mustard told SPACE.com last week.

The new evidence
Scientists know that Mars was once wetter than it is today. Data from NASA's Mars Rovers reveal significant amounts of liquid water must have existed billions of years ago. Since then, the planet has dried up. Scientists have been eager to determine how much water might have remained beneath the surface, either as ice or in occasional pockets of liquid that might support life.

The newfound pack ice, just five degrees from the equator, might have collected millions of years ago when volcanic tempests and water floods brought it down from nearby areas in the Elysium region of the planet, researchers say. Scars to the landscape serve as evidence of those past floods.

Until now, however, scientists had assumed any lakes or seas that resulted from the flooding had either evaporated away or, if frozen into icebergs, had "sublimated" directly into the atmosphere.

"We have found evidence consistent with a presently existing frozen body of water, with surface pack-ice," the scientists write in a paper that is scheduled to be published in March in the journal Nature.

The journal's contents are normally not released prior to publication. The research was first reported on by New Scientist magazine, which says the paper was not under embargo when first viewed by the magazine. SPACE.com has reviewed the paper.

The research was discussed yesterday at a scientific meeting in Europe.

“The fact that there have been warm and wet places beneath the surface of Mars since before life began on Earth, and that some are probably still there, means that there is a possibility that primitive micro-organisms survive on Mars today," study co-leader John Murray at the Open University in the UK said in today's statement. "This mission has changed many of my long-held opinions about Mars – we now have to go there and check it out."

CONTINUED

1 | 2 | Next >