A 20 km wide water plan lies beneath a Mars icecap

Using a satellite to look under layers of dust and ice at the south pole of Mars, scientists have detected a brackish water extent of 20 kilometers wide, wide, stable reservoir-like lakes buried beneath the Antarctic Ice Sheet on Earth.

The much-sought discovery, the greatest detection of liquid water on the red planet, raises the tempting possibility of a very cold and very salty niche where life might have "It could be, maybe to be, the first habitat we find on Mars, "said global scientist Roberto Orosei of the National Institute of Astrophysics in Italy, who led the study published in the journal Science .

To be clear, there is no sign of actual Martian microbes swimming around, and the environment is not obviously hospitable – the water at the base of the cap Polar is estimated at -67 degrees Celsius, well below the typical freezing point of water.

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in liquid form by salty brine that Orosei and his colleagues speculatively describe as "mud".

Scientists do not even know exactly what the so-called water plane, which they detected by analyzing radar echoes collected over three years by the Orbiting Mars Express spatialship. [19659003] They can not see the bottom with the existing equipment, but they estimate that it is at least 1 meter deep, otherwise they would not have detected it at all. It could be a subglacial lake, an aquifer or a layer of sediment saturated with water.

Marines have often been observed, but they are usually old, fleeting or frozen.

of a long-standing liquid water tank is a thrilling proof of an idea that began to be debated thirty years ago: there could be water at the base of the ice caps of Mars, similar to what is present on Earth. The discovery, if confirmed, will provide a new insight into Mars' climatic history, stimulate the search for other underground water sources, provide a possible resource for people traveling on the planet and will help to look for signs of Martian life.

One of the ingredients that scientists seek in the search for life is water – not just traces of moisture or ice that freeze and vaporize, but stable water sources – as an underground lake or aquifer.

"When the extremes occur, life moves in the rocks.This is a fundamental aspect of astrobiology," said Jim Green, chief scientist of NASA, who said: did not participate in the study.

"The concept of liquid water somewhere on Mars suggests that there might be an Orosei environment and his colleagues used a radar instrument called Marsis aboard the Mars Express spacecraft to make their discovery

Marsis sends electromagnetic impulses to the planet and measures their echo – Orosei and his colleagues have discovered in particular luminous reflections of a vast region extending for about 20km, about 1.5km under the

The measurements were taken over three years and then, fearing that the bright spots could be water, could blind them, Orosei and his colleagues spent almost as long trying to demolish their own data.

Mars, like many advanced science fields, has a history of exciting discoveries – such as the discovery of water flowing over the air. In 1965, Jeffrey Plaut of Jet Propulsio NASA's Laboratory n said in an email that the interpretation of liquid water is "certainly plausible, but it's not" On Earth, no one would be surprised by such a discovery. The normal interpretation would be that we discovered an underglacial lake and that people would drill and find out if it is true, "says Orosei. On Mars, it's much more difficult, of course, because we can not drill in the ice. "19659003] Green says that a landing mission called InSight that is already en route to Mars might be able to help provide corroborating evidence.

The LG, planned to land in November, has a thermal probe instrument that will drill five meters This will allow scientists to create models of the heat that flows from the planet, like a cake that cools after being cooked – and which should determine if it is plausible that the temperature is high enough to keep water in liquid form at this depth.

Several researchers have said that it would be crucial to determine whether this plan of water is the only, or part of an interconnected set of underground aquifers – in part because a

Stephen Clifford, a scientist who works today in the Institute of Planetary Sciences, first exp dared the idea that there could be water plans under the polar ice caps of Mars 30 years ago.

"It's rewarding, in that the work I've done was purely theoretical, and I think it's always a good thing when someone finds some evidence that your theoretical work is related to reality, "said Clifford

. the result has made the effort worth it – and the expectation of the proof is worth it. "

– The Washington Post