Stellary Starry Universe

 

Fresh meteorite impacts are exposing underground ice on Mars. NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is beaming back must-see photos of the process at work.

 

September 24, 2009: Meteorites recently striking Mars have exposed deposits of frozen water not far below the Martian surface. Pictures of the impact sites taken by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter show that frozen water may be available to explorers of the Red Planet at lower latitudes than previously thought.

“This ice is a relic of a more humid climate from perhaps just several thousand years ago,” says Shane Byrne of the University of Arizona, Tucson.

“We now know we can use new impact sites as places to look for ice in the shallow subsurface,” adds Megan Kennedy of Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego, a co-author of the paper and member of the team operating the orbiter’s Context Camera.

 

Source: Nasa Science – click here for full article