New Mars Express And Huygens Results, ESA conference - November 30, 2005 Options

[Guest_paulanderson_*]

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMA96ULWFE_index_0.html

Relating to Mars Express:

"At the same time, ESA’s Mars Express mission is continuing its investigations of Mars, painting a new picture of the 'red planet'. This includes the first ever probing below the surface of Mars, new geological clues with implications for the climate, newly-discovered surface and atmospheric features and, above all, traces of the presence of water on this world."

[Guest_paulanderson_*]

Getting back to today's results...

As others have noted, the press conference itself left a lot to be desired, I watched it also (I couldn't always hear the speakers or read the slides properly), but the results themselves are wonderful. I've seen various media pieces take different slants on it though, as usual.

Re the ESA press releases today, while larger oceans or seas may now seem less likely in Mars' past (as implied), the new evidence also shows there was still an earlier wet period of non-acidic and "stably present" liquid water (re the phyllosilicates), at least in large aquifers, which pre-dated the acidic and salty sulphates. If life ever did originate in this friendlier period, it could have then survived and perhaps even flourished. Re Marz' comments in post #22, the NASA update from yesterday outlines that kind of scenario:

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2005/nov/H...er_secrets.html

"Many types of microbes live in the Rio Tinto environment, one of the reasons for concluding that ancient Meridiani could have been habitable. However, the organisms at Rio Tinto are descended from populations that live in less acidic and stressful habitats. If Meridiani had any life, it might have had to originate in a different habitat. "You need to be very careful when you are talking about the prospect for life on Mars," Knoll said. "We've looked at only a very small parcel of Martian real estate. The geological record Opportunity has examined comes from a relatively short period out of Mars' long history."

Well put, and now we have, it seems, just such an earlier "different habitat."

Also, New Scientist is quoting William Johnson, MARSIS manager at JPL, that the flat subsurface feature in the buried crater could be liquid water, not just ice:

http://www.newscientistspace.com/article/d...an-surface.html

"Intriguingly, the signal reflected from the bottom of the crater is so strong and appears so flat that it may be liquid water. "If you put water there, that's what the signal might look like," Johnson told New Scientist. But he cautions the data is based on only one pass over the region and could be caused by another material."

Just a possibility at this point, but a possibility all the same.