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Mars, is there water on the red planet?

Water on Mars discovery

The surface of Mars is covered in enigmatic features that resemble those caused by running water on Earth. It is very likely that liquid water ran across the surface of mars in the past and even that Mars had an ocean. But how and why did this water disappear?

The Mars Odyssey spacecraft, which arrived at Mars on 24 October 2001, discovered a layer of water ice in the planet’s soil. The ice consists of frozen mud in a layer of permafrost, about one metre beneath the surface. The Viking landers also photographed a faint shimmer on the planet’s soil at sunrise: a white layer of ice crystals (frost).

Mars-Express made the headlines in 2004 when the SPICAM and OMEGA instrument detected water ice in contact with the atmosphere on the Southern polar cap.

Later, in 2005, the MARSIS radar instrument found not only that the lower layers of the polar caps were composed of almost pure water, it discovered some deep subterranean ice deposits at other latitudes. The mapping of these deposits is still on-going.

How much water in Mars atmosphere?

The amount of water present in the atmosphere of Mars never exceeds 100 micrometers. By way of comparison, Earth’s atmosphere is considered very dry when the amount of rain water does not exceed 1 mm. Further research is required to understand the water cycle on Mars.

Residual water ice on the floor of Vastitas Borealis Crater on Mars. Credits ESA/DLR/FU Berlin (G. Neukum)