How much water did Mars have in its ancient past and when did it disappear? This is what a recent study published in Geophysical Research Letters hopes to address as an international team of scientists investigated Mars’ ancient water cycle processes, including its transport mechanisms between the surface and subsurface. This study has the potential to help scientists better understand ancient Mars and whether the Red Planet could have had the ingredients for life as we know it.
For the study, the researchers used computer models to simulate the length of time that liquid water on the surface of Mars billions of years ago required to go from the surface to the subsurface, specifically to mile-deep aquifers. While this same process takes only a few days on Earth, the researchers estimated that it took between 50 to 200 years on Mars for liquid water to go from the surface to the subsurface aquifers.
Graphic from the computer models depicting rates at which liquid water went from the surface to the subsurface on Mars. (Credit: Mohammad Afzal Shadab)
This study could help answer the underlying question regarding what happened to all of the liquid water on Mars billions of years ago, as scientists continue to be puzzled by its disappearance. Despite this, substantial evidence remains on the surface in the form of dried riverbeds, lake beds, and sediments that indicate flowing liquid water once cascaded across the surface long ago. Going forward, the researchers aspire to use their model to learn more about Mars’ ancient past.
“We want to implement this into [an integrated model] of how the water and land evolved together over millions of years to the present state,” said Dr. Mohammad Afzal Shadab, who is a postdoctoral research associate at Princeton University and lead author of the study. “That will bring us very close to answering what happened to the water on Mars.”
What new discoveries about ancient Mars will researchers make in the coming years and decades? Only time will tell, and this is why we science!
As always, keep doing science & keep looking up!
Sources: Geophysical Research Letters, EurekAlert!