Local researchers have brought the world one step closer to a science fiction dream — the presence of abundant water on the Red Planet.
An analysis led by a University of California, San Diego-based professor has provided the strongest evidence to date that Mars has abundant water in its planetary crust.
Vashan Wright, a geophysicist and assistant professor at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography, led a team that used data gathered from the Mars InSight Lander during a four-year mission, which ended in December 2022, to study the planet’s crust.
The lander collected information from the ground directly beneath it, such as from temblors and other disturbances, and then fed that data into a model informed by rock physics to take a look at what might be beneath the planet’s surface.
That information helped reseachers determine that the presence of liquid water in the crust was the most plausible explanation for what they were seeing.
The analysis is one step closer to understanding the geological history of Mars, which in turn may provide better understanding into its potential habitability by humans.
“Understanding the Martian water cycle is critical for understanding the evolution of the climate, surface, and interior,” Wright said.
“A useful starting point is to identify where water is and how much is there.”
The study appears this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, the National Science Foundation, and the U.S. Office of Naval Research supported the work.
Besides Wright, the study authors are Matthias Morzfeld of Scripps Oceanography, and Michael Manga from the University of California, Berkeley.
