NASA Finds Evidence of Recent Flowing Water on Mars 238
SonicSpike writes to mention that Scientists are claiming that they have evidence of water flowing on Mars within the last five years. From the article: "Subsurface aquifers or melting ground ice were floated as possible sources of the water. One of the springs even appears at a fault line, according to Malin, just as they often do on Earth. The shortness of the gulleys, which seem to flow for but a few hundred yards, might be accounted for by a process similar to a volcano's eruption on Earth, with water instead of magma building up underground, and ice, instead of fire, characterizing the resulting flow."
I bet.. (Score:2, Interesting)
Lots More Pictures (Score:5, Informative)
On a side note [slashdot.org], the HiRISE team [uanews.org] is now posting new large images [arizona.edu] on the HiRISE Website [arizona.edu] every week on Wednesday. (A file size and format warning is needed. The full super high resolution photo of the Opportunity landing site [arizona.edu] is 677 MBytes in JP2 format)
Of course, there are some pics that I wouldn't mind a little more investigation on. I happen to be interested in something I call Gulliver's Golf Ball [usgs.gov], something that looks like a perfect sphere, roughly 200 meters across.
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Aha! (Score:2)
Mod parent up (Score:4, Insightful)
You probably can't get closer to the reality. BBC [bbc.co.uk] is reporting it too and there they say:
"Other scientists think it possible that gullies like this were caused not by water but by liquid carbon dioxide.
One of the reasons for favouring CO2 was that computer models of the Martian crust indicated water could exist only at depths of several kilometres. Liquid carbon dioxide, on the other hand, could persist much nearer the surface where temperatures can drop as low as -107C."
But for funding it just has to be water, that's science and that's sad.
(I don't blame them, I know game too, different league, same rules.)
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INNACURATE! This is Hype! (Score:4, Informative)
"Nothing in the images, no matter how cool they are, proves that the flows were wet, or that they were anything more exciting than avalanches of sand and dust," Allan Treiman, a geologist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston said in an e-mail.
nuff said.
Get your ass to Mars
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Re:INNACURATE! This is Hype! (Score:4, Informative)
Well, yes, but according to the scientists at the press conference all disturbances of the martian soil so far have shown up as darker than the undisturbed soil, not lighter as these images show. Also, the shapes of the light spots are more consistent with those a relatively thick muddy liquid would make than with what you'd see in a landslide. They did allow that yes, these images could be showing some previously unseen dry phenomenon, but that the shapes and color are both indicative of liquid.
Re:INNACURATE! This is Hype! (Score:5, Funny)
Did you just volunteer?
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I'd say re-entry counts as space. I would also say blowing up shortly after launch counts as part of the voyage, too. From my vantage point, NASA has lost plenty of people.
As far as traveling to Mars, I'd say the bigger problem is keeping the astronauts from killing each other.
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That's correct! Their track record is currently only interplanetary. We're still arguably at the dawn of space travel (assuming there's a whole day of space travel ahead of us, otherwise we're not even at the dawn of space travel). Therefore we have no stellar flight, only interplanetary. Perhaps you were just born into the wrong century?
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You just have to want to explore more than you want to live.
If NASA said, "we can settle the moon at 1% of the cost but 10% of the people will die" you would see thousands lining up for a shot to live on the moon.
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I really think a ONE WAY manned mission is doable in the next few years, and I would be willing to bet there would be volunteers for it.
Im not saying this a a troll, I really think it is a viable option. Many more experiments could be carried aboard, no worries about long
Volunteers (Score:2)
Finding volunteers for spaceflight is a non-issue. Finding qualified ones...well, that's probably still a non-issue. It's the nerd equivalent of offering Joe Sixpack tickets to the Super Bowl if he'll just smear hot grits all over Natalie Portman.
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If he didn't, I do. Hell yeah. I daresay you could recruit an entire colony's worth of volunteers from /. alone...
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You could only recruit half a colony. Colonies need women, you know!
Oops. (Score:2, Funny)
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Wow! (Score:2)
This looks like the real deal. It appears that it's being reported everywhere; CNN, etc. When I saw the original article I was slightly skeptical, but NASA ain't screwing around, it appears.
I am OP (Score:4, Informative)
Oh well, at least I got credit for it and good karma
Hmmm, how to get a closer look? (Score:5, Insightful)
At the other end of the scale we need to develop landers that can investigate hard to get to locations like the very bottom of Valles Marineris. I assume this is where what little atmosphere there is would be the most dense, warm, and possibly moist. This would also be the most sheltered location on Mars from all forms of ionizing radiation.
Re:Hmmm, how to get a closer look? (Score:5, Funny)
"Look, there is some water! Quick, lets crash a probe there and create a nice impact crater where very possibly the last life on Mars exists!"
No WONDER life on Mars has been so hard to find; it is hiding out of fear.
Re:Hmmm, how to get a closer look? (Score:5, Funny)
Why? (Score:2)
WMD (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Hmmm, how to get a closer look? (Score:5, Funny)
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Squirt is direct. Google requires your imagination. I assure you that my imagination can be far worse.
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When you squirt [squirt.org] something, you're trying to find a gay hookup.
Think about it.
Still a data transfer (Score:3, Informative)
too late to keep that out of the language ;) (Score:2)
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Too late. In fact, common parlance for initiating a transmission from a ground station to a satellite is "squirting the bird", as in "The antenna is locked on the beacon, are we ready to squirt the bird?"
How bad could it be (Score:2)
Ok yeah given the sloven stereotype of geeks, I guess it could be pretty bad.
Re:Hmmm, how to get a closer look? (Score:5, Funny)
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Depending on the site you visit, I suppose you get to squirt back. It's only fair.
Re:Hmmm, how to get a closer look? (Score:4, Insightful)
"Cheap and expendable" and "in orbit around Mars in reserve for an indefinite amount of time" are mutally exclusive.
Re: Killing Several Birds With One Stone... Probe (Score:2)
To elaborate the micro-probes would be ideally wedded in data communication to such an orbiter already. Thus why not house them in the orbiter until needed? Orbiters periodically need orbital adjustments, low altitude orbiters need periodic orbital boosts. I don't know how efficient this would be for re-
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Which for all intents and purposes means a dedicated orbiter - thus sending "cheap and expendable" right back out the window.
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I vote we mod down (Score:2)
The rush to colonize (Score:4, Funny)
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Although who's to say Mars didn't have fjords in some ancient distant aquatic past.
coast 2 coast (Score:3, Informative)
He apparently had seen this stuff in mars rover pictures and predicted it.... guess nasa has finally came to the same conclusion.
I bet they were just more thorough or cautious in their analysis before declaring anything.
Re: (sp?) (Score:2, Funny)
W-h-a-c-k J-o-b
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Re:coast 2 coast (Score:5, Funny)
Actually, the water is really the face on Mars [nasa.gov] crying.
Probably because of something you did.
It might have been something I did (Score:2)
Sorry everybody.
Where's their sense of adventure? (Score:2)
NASA is more cautious than anal-probe radio-show guy?
What a bunch of pansies! That's no way to do science.
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Hoagland, The Nut (Score:2)
Flow Means Bi-directional Movement (Score:5, Interesting)
For water to flow, it has to have gotten to the source of the flow first. So, there has to be a mechanism for transport back to the source of the flow. Like rain moves water on Earth back to higher ground. The article offers no speculation on this transport mechanism. I would, of course, suspect evaporation and then dew/frost. But, that would be picked up easily from our probes and even from Earth-based observation.
What am I missing here?
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
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Move over... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Move over... (Score:5, Funny)
Thats no moon.
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Martian Martini?
Funny (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Funny (Score:4, Insightful)
Personally, I'll believe the H2O theory when someone actually pokes one of those areas, and they find water in either ice or liquid form.
Seconded. (Score:2)
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This, of course, is why the focus of every recent mission has been to find the water they suspect exists??!!?
I'm not sure they support either a "dry Mars" or a wet one. It seems to me, they support good science, or at least try to in this instant gratification, pseudo-scientific alien abduction craving society. You don't publish your theory until there is damn good evidence to support it.
Newton really was [wikipedia.org] wrong about physics, ev
Water is here, right now. (Score:2)
In this instance, we actually have photographic evidence, with one picture in 2001 and another in 2005 showing an actual change over the course of y
Not 100% (Score:5, Informative)
"Many scientists believe the gullies were carved by liquid water, although others have argued they are due to avalanches of carbon dioxide gas or rivers of dust," from The New Scientist [newscientist.com].
Also, here [nasa.gov] is the NASA release from their site.
Not quite on the surface (Score:5, Informative)
You can see the flow emerges from the side of an impact crater.
The water was most likely locked underground (as expected by the briney moist soil effect the rovers noticed just under the surface)
Its like diggign a hole in the sand at the beach, eventually water will start to seep in.
Supply and demand (Score:2, Funny)
White stuff around the crater rim (Score:2)
Dan Quayle reportedly excited, gasping (Score:4, Funny)
Lucky we created www.marshydro.com in 2000 then!.. (Score:2)
Re:Lucky we created www.marshydro.com in 2000 then (Score:2)
Forget not the special plumbing you'll need to handle the resulting "space wiz."
"Remember folks, when you drink Olympus Ale, the special Martian molecules must be processed by our extra special Deimosian Commode, yours for only $85,000. Also try our Baldet Bidet, made from 75% Baldet Crater clay, pumping fresh streams of Martian Melt for your refreshment."
To all sceptics: here's proof (Score:5, Funny)
(And if you're still not convinced you can even try this at home...)
Bloody nonsense! (Score:5, Funny)
There's a party over there (Score:3, Funny)
"Aw man, I can't believe you left our chess club bash last night. FIVE MINUTES after you left, the entire cheerleader squad stumbled in and started making some unconventional moves with the bishops!"
"Dude, you JUST missed it. The keg floated FIVE MINUTES ago, and the stores are all closed now."
"Man, I'm telling you, the water was just here FIVE YEARS ago. What took your ass so long to get here?!?"
Sewage (Score:2)
One man knows the answer (Score:3, Funny)
Keep in mind... (Score:2)
Looking to the near future, I wouldn't be at all surprised if the Mars Reconnaissances Orbiter (MRO) [nasa.gov] delivers a more clear picture of whats going on up there...
Total Recall was right!!! (Score:2, Funny)
One more puzzle piece (Score:3, Interesting)
This idea was floated before ... (Score:2)
The Question Must be Asked (Score:2)
Is this Artesian water? Or perhaps, Martesian water..
Thanks, I'll be here all week!
NASA PR (Score:2, Insightful)
Now I have the highest respect for the NASA scientists and I don't doubt their work, but both in the 'bacteria' case and in this one there are far more likely scenarios, which are supported by plenty of good scientists. They publish in the media anyway
Great! US will be there in no time! (Score:2, Funny)
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The coincidence here likely has to do with the fact we lost contact with MGS just a few weeks ago, and it's unlikely we'll make contact again. This is likely the MGS team's final report, letting them go out on a bang.
I hope the MO and MRO teams can pick up where the MGS team left off.
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It was George Bush's fault.
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First, look at the electric dust devils of Mars etching the ground black as it moves across:
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/arch05/0509 16dustdevil.htm [thunderbolts.info]
Now look at the scalloped curled trenches that would result from a pair of Birkeland Currents twisting around one another (as happens in plasma globes). The scalloping and flat bottoms are exactly the same thing you notice on asteroid and cometary craters too
http [thunderbolts.info]
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What, like this place?
http://www.aas.org/publications/baas/v33n3/dps200
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Don't you mean "frickin' lasers"?