Earthlike Mars? Options

[glennwsmith]

All, I know this isn't the right place for this post, but I've looked around and can't find an appropriate, current UMSF forum (Doug, perhaps you could give me some guidance on establishing such) -- so here goes: I think a [the] new paradigm for Martian geology is rapidly coalescing, namely, that Mars is very much like the Earth in terms of the preponderance of water -- except that it is all frozen, and covered under a thin layer of dust/regolith! See, for example, this article:

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/news/41995902.html

Hence the "seepages" found in crater walls; hence the evidence of catastophic flooding -- the result of volcanism melting huge pockets of ice. And I am going to add my own wrinkle (probably not original): that the differentiation of Mars into a rougher southern hemisphere and smoother northern hemsphere represents something like Earth's Pangea stage, ie, the northern hemisphere is a vast frozen sea covered with a thin layer of ice.

[marsbug]

I suspect it was introduced to the chambre to, but I'll ask. For anyone following this topic we're talking with Prof Chevrier here.

The evidence doesn't point to the phoenix site being rich in brine, but if a brine formed from components present at the phoenix site can be stable under accurately reproduced conditions then, given the size of the martian arctic, I'd bet my favourite coat (and it's a very nice coat, if a bit matrix-esque for every day use) that brines do occur, even if only rarely.

There is another thread, here, where we were taking over the formation of brines with Hanna Sizemore, a phoenix team postdoc. She is adamant that even under ideal conditions the most liquid water you'd see at the phoenix site is a few monolayers. However she was fending off talk of liquid droplets on the landers legs, and even open pools of brine, so she might be willing to go as far as 'ten monolayers, in the right spot under the best conditions imaginable' or similar if she doesnt feel like the only skeptic in the room. I hope there's room in the martian arctic for a few exceptional microclimates where brine can form in detectable amounts, becuse I reeally like that coat!

It seems that stable brines can exist on mars, using solutes available at the phoenix landing site, and at the MER's sites and the viking 1 site (see link on post 40), and there are reserves of water ice at lattitudes as low as 45 degrees north (see link on post 44), so I'll eat the coat if there aren't a few damp patches up there from time to time. It's leather so I'll have to get a big tenderiser