Temperature and pressure at Gale, Suitable (for short periods) for liquid water? |
Temperature and pressure at Gale, Suitable (for short periods) for liquid water? |
Sep 30 2012, 03:23 PM
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#1
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Junior Member Group: Members Posts: 62 Joined: 11-July 11 Member No.: 6058 |
Just a quick query from someone with no background in science. Obviously, MSL has AFAIK not returned evidence of recent (i.e. years/decades) liquid water in its vicinity; however, I was interested by the following graphs:
08.21.2012: First Pressure Readings on Mars http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/images/?ImageID=4501 08.21.2012: Taking Mars' Temperature http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/images/?ImageID=4502 The first indicates that the pressure between 15 Aug and 18 Aug never dropped below c. 690 millibars; the second shows that, for a period of a couple of hours on 16 Aug, the temperature rose above freezing. If water had been present on the surface, then, would it have been liquid during this brief period? The pressure and temperature seemed to satisfy the conditions for liquid water as I understand them (indeed, the pressure seems to be high enough (just) on a 24-hour basis to allow for the presence of liquid water). Thanks in advance for your opinions (corroborative or not!) on this. |
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Oct 1 2012, 07:39 PM
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#2
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Senior Member Group: Moderator Posts: 2785 Joined: 10-November 06 From: Pasadena, CA Member No.: 1345 |
Hmmm. That's a good question, but off the top of my head I'd guess no, it wouldn't. Local airspeed is probably a bigger factor, with faster winds increasing sublimation (and evaporation).
-------------------- Some higher resolution images available at my photostream: http://www.flickr.com/photos/31678681@N07/
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Oct 1 2012, 08:00 PM
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#3
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Junior Member Group: Members Posts: 85 Joined: 5-September 12 Member No.: 6635 |
An interesting experiment I've had students do is to use a syringe to boil water at room temperature and then refrigerate the syringe and redo the experiment.
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Oct 3 2012, 01:53 AM
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#4
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Junior Member Group: Members Posts: 57 Joined: 20-January 12 From: Florida Member No.: 6317 |
It is interesting that in the NASA presentation of the fan outflow pattern last week, there was no discussion of where all that water came from in the first place. Based on the location of Gale crater, it would seem to have been from the northern ocean that was assumed to exist in the Noachian age. A long time ago.
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