MSL scientific results |
MSL scientific results |
May 30 2013, 12:45 PM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 237 Joined: 22-December 07 From: Alice Springs, N.T. Australia Member No.: 3989 |
Been busy with other things for a while, so it's nice to be back and see all the photo imaging work on the site going from strength to strength
I think a lot of you guys would really enjoy "Curiosity On Mars:First Results" 3 part x approx 2 hr presentations at the EuroGeosciences Union General Assembly published on the EGU Channel on YouTube on May16th. Plenty of good listening for the weekend! Although I enjoy the NASA press briefings, it's great to hear key mission scientists talking full-on to their peers. The talks travel along at a nice fast thought provoking pace! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPbbhfGg0nc Admin: Moved post from 'First Drill' thread. |
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Nov 13 2013, 09:20 PM
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Junior Member Group: Members Posts: 94 Joined: 11-August 12 Member No.: 6536 |
AGU abstracts are now available online here. (Link edited and fixed. Thanks Phil!)
There's a lot there. For instance: "Sedimentary rocks of the YBF [Yellowknife Bay Formation] preserve a remarkable diversity of diagenetic textural features. These features can be roughly subdivided into at least two phases of activity: (1) formation of early concretions, voids, and internally banded ridges, potentially associated with a set of redox reactions that may have produced gases of, as yet, unknown character, and (2) later precipitation of Ca-sulfate (anhydrite, bassanite, and perhaps gypsum) in veins and in early diagenetic voids that are cross-cut by veins." "Title: Raised Ridges in the Sheepbed Member as Evidence for Early Subaqueous Diagenesis at Yellowknife Bay Spatially restricted clusters of erosion-resistant, ridged fracture fills have been found throughout the fine-grained clay-rich Sheepbed member of the Yellowknife Bay Formation ... these are interpreted as early diagenetic synaeresis cracks, likely formed by gas expansion... the fracture-filling also occurred subaqueously, in the phreatic zone, and was likely a very early diagenetic process" "TITLE: The Mineralogical and Chemical Case for Habitability at Yellowknife Bay, Gale crater, Mars ...The presence of Fe and S in both reduced and oxidized states represents chemical disequilibria that could have been utilized ...Saponitization of olivine (a process analogous to serpentinization) could have produced H2 in situ. Indeed, early diagenetic hollow nodules (“minibowls”) present in the Cumberland mudstone are interpreted by some as forming when gas bubbles accumulated in the unconsolidated mudstone... A rough estimate of the minimum duration of the lacustrine environment is provided by the minimum thickness of the Sheepbed member. Given 1.5 meters, and applying a mean sediment accumulation rate for lacustrine strata of 1 m/1000 yrs yields a duration of 1,500 years. If the aqueous environments represented by overlying strata are considered, such as Gillespie Lake and Shaler, then this duration increases." And: "A potential analog for the Sheepbed smectite is ‘griffithite,’ a variety of trioctahedral smectite in altered basalt of the Topanga formation, Griffith Park, Los Angeles." I love the irony of sending Curiosity all the way from Pasadena to Gale Crater, only to find the same rocks as are present a short drive away in Griffith Park. |
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