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by EMILIANO RODRIGUEZ MEGA, Associated Press
This image of May 12, 2016 provided by NASA shows the planet Mars. A study published Wednesday, July 25, 2018 in the journal Science suggests that a huge saltwater lake seems to be buried deep in Mars, raising the possibility of finding life on the red planet. (NASA / ESA / Hubble Heritage Team – STScI / AURA, Bell J. – ASU, M. Wolff – Institute for Space Science via AP)
NEW YORK (AP) – A huge salt water lake seems to be buried deep in Mars, raising the possibility of finding life on the red planet, scientists reported Wednesday.
The discovery, based on observations by a European spacecraft, generated the excitement of the experts. Water is essential to life as we know it, and scientists have long sought to prove that the liquid is present on Mars.
"If these researchers are right, it's the first time we find a great water plan on Mars," said Cbadie Stuurman, a geophysicist at the University of Texas who has found signs of a huge Martian ice deposit in 2016.
Scott Hubbard, professor of astronautics at Stanford University "
" At the time, our motto was "follow the water". That's the phrase that captured everything, "said Hubbard." So, this discovery, if it exists, is exciting because it's the culmination of this philosophy. "
L & # 39; study, published in the journal Science, does not determine the depth of the reservoir.This means that scientists can not specify whether it is an underground pool, a body aquifer or a layer of mud.
To find water, Italian researchers badyzed the radar signals collected over three years by Mars.Express spacecraft.Their findings suggest that a reservoir 20 kilometers long lies under the ice about 1.5 kilometers thick in an area near the south pole of the planet.
They spent at least two years examining the data to be made "I do not really have any other explanation, "said astrophysicist Roberto Orosei of the National Institute it astrophysics alien from Bologna and lead author of the study.
Mars is very cold, but the water could have been protected from freezing by dissolved salts. It's the same as when you put salt on a road, says Kirsten Siebach, a planetary geologist at Rice University who was not part of the study.
"This water would be extremely cold, just when it is on the verge of. It would not be an ideal condition for life to form," says Siebach.
Yet, she says, there are microbes on Earth that have been able to adapt to such environments.
Orosei "It is tempting to think that it is the first candidate place where life could persist" on Mars.
He suspects Mars of containing other hidden water plans, waiting to be discovered.
popular target for exploration, with robots on its surface and other probes examining the planet since the orbit. In May, NASA launched another spacecraft, the Mars InSight lander, which will dig under the surface after reaching a flat plain just north of the Martian equator in November.
Related: Mars Closest to Earth in 15 Years
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