‘Where we find water, we find life’
Scientists have found evidence of salty water flowing on Mars during summertime on the Red Planet. There is a possibility of finding life on Mars.
A NASA spacecraft circling Mars has found evidence of flowing water on the Red Planet’s surface – and in our time, not in some dim and more verdant past.
Humans may like to think Earth has the solar system’s monopoly on water, but a new study reveals that Earth’s close neighbour boasts multiple seeps of salt-laden water that were wet, or at least damp, as recently as last year.
Until now, “we thought of the current Mars as a barren, extremely dry and cold desert, ”SETI Institute planetary scientist Janice Bishop, who did not take part in the research, says via email. “What is new and exciting here is that this provides evidence for liquid water on Mars in the current environment.”
It is a definitive signs of liquid water on the surface of present-day Mars, a finding that will fuel speculation that life, if it ever arose there, could persist to now.
It seems that the more we study Mars, the more we learn how life could be supported and where there are resources to support life in the future.
At least that’s the case on Earth, as Dr Joe Michalski of the Natural History Museum explains. Will it be true on Mars too?
These results provide strong evidence that salty water occasionally flows on the Martian surface, even today. We know from the study of extremophiles on Earth that life can not only survive, but thrive in conditions that are hyperarid, very saline or otherwise ‘extreme’ in comparison to what is habitable to a human. In fact, on Earth, wherever we find water, we find life.
This finding is yet another example of water on Mars, but a hugely important one because it points to environments that could potentially be habitable to certain kinds of bacteria, even today.
