Newton Crater: Evidence for Recent Water on Mars
Explanation:
What could have formed these unusual channels?
Inside a small
crater that lies inside large
Newton Crater on
Mars, numerous narrow channels run from the
top down to the crater floor.
The
above picture covers a region spanning about 3000 meters across.
These and other
gullies have been found on Mars in
recent high-resolution pictures taken by the orbiting
Mars Global Surveyor robot spacecraft.
Similar channels on Earth are formed by flowing water,
but on Mars the temperature is normally too cold and the
atmosphere too thin to sustain
liquid water.
Nevertheless, many scientists now hypothesize that
liquid water did burst out here from underground
Mars, eroded the gullies,
and pooled at the bottom as it froze and evaporated.
If so, life-sustaining
ice and water might exist
even today below the
Martian surface --
water that could potentially support a
human mission to Mars.
Research into this exciting possibility is sure to continue!
Authors & editors:
Robert Nemiroff
(MTU) &
Jerry Bonnell
(USRA)
NASA Web Site Statements, Warnings,
and Disclaimers
NASA Official: Jay Norris.
Specific
rights apply.
A service of:
LHEA at
NASA /
GSFC
& Michigan Tech. U.
