NASA’s Curiosity Rover Solves Ancient Mystery on Mars

Over the past 13 years, the four-wheeled Curiosity rover has traveled astir 21 miles (34 kilometers) crossed the Martian aboveground to stitchery clues astir the anticipation of past beingness connected the Red Planet. A caller find by the metallic explorer could supply an reply to the longstanding question of what happened to Mars’ ambiance billions of years ago, and however the satellite whitethorn person transformed from a wet, life-friendly satellite to a adust and arid desert.

The Curiosity rover precocious uncovered ample deposits of c wrong sulfate-rich layers of Mount Sharp successful Mars’ interaction basin, Gale Crater. In a paper published this period successful the diary Science, information from 3 of Curiosity’s drill sites revealed an abundance of siderite—an robust carbonate mineral that had been a missing portion successful the puzzle of Mars’ wet, habitable past.

Water and c dioxide respond to signifier carbonate minerals. Based connected the mentation of Mars’ perchance habitable past, the satellite whitethorn person erstwhile had a thick, c dioxide-rich ambiance and liquid h2o connected its surface. So if some h2o and c dioxide were contiguous during Mars’ past past, past truthful should grounds of carbonate minerals. Previous discoveries, however, weren’t capable to find capable amounts of carbonate to lucifer the theory. That is until Curiosity’s caller discovery.

“The find of abundant siderite successful Gale Crater represents some a astonishing and important breakthrough successful our knowing of the geologic and atmospheric improvement of Mars,” Benjamin Tutolo, subordinate prof astatine the University of Calgary, Canada, and pb writer of the paper, said successful a statement.

Although scientists person agelong suspected that Mars had an ambiance affluent successful c dioxide, Curiosity’s findings are the archetypal mineral grounds to enactment that theory. “It tells america that the satellite was habitable and that the models for habitability are correct,” Tutolo added.

As Mars’ ambiance thinned implicit time, the c dioxide transformed into stone form. The c dioxide had been warming the satellite up until that time, and erstwhile it began to precipitate arsenic siderite, it affected the planet’s quality to stay lukewarm and support its aboveground water, according to the researchers.

Curiosity rover uses a drill attached to its limb to bore holes successful Martian stone and cod the powdered samples from the stone into its belly. The rover drills astir 3 to 4 centimeters into Mars’ subsurface, and the samples are deposited into its CheMin instrument, which uses X-ray diffraction to analyse rocks and soil. “Drilling done the layered Martian aboveground is similar going done a past book,” Thomas Bristow, probe idiosyncratic astatine NASA’s Ames Research Center, and coauthor of the paper, said successful a statement. “Just a fewer centimeters down gives america a bully thought of the minerals that formed astatine oregon adjacent to the aboveground astir 3.5 cardinal years ago.”

Since the carbonate minerals were recovered beneath the aboveground of Mars, the find suggests that they whitethorn beryllium masked by different minerals successful near-infrared outer images of the satellite from orbit. That whitethorn explicate wherefore erstwhile missions person failed astatine uncovering grounds of carbonate minerals connected Mars. If carbonate minerals are abundant successful different sulfate-rich areas connected Mars, that is capable to make conditions for a lukewarm satellite with liquid h2o connected its surface, according to the paper.

“Earth’s aboveground has been continuously habitable since astir 3.5 cardinal years ago, but Mars’s aboveground evolved from much habitable aboriginal on, to uninhabitable today,” Edwin Kite, subordinate prof of geophysical sciences astatine the University of Chicago and 3rd writer connected the paper, said successful a statement. “This find helps america recognize the mechanisms that drove the 2 planets down precise antithetic paths.”