Oceans on Mars - "confirmed"

[brellis]

space.com article<br /><br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font size="2" color="#ff0000"><em><strong>I'm a recovering optimist - things could be better.</strong></em></font> </p> </div>

 

[qso1]

This is good news which needs to bubble up to CNN to reach the masses. And it probably will in a few days. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><strong>My borrowed quote for the time being:</strong></p><p><em>There are three kinds of people in life. Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen...and those who do not know what happened.</em></p> </div>

 

[paulscottanderson]

See my other thread for several more news links:<br /><br />http://uplink.space.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=sciastro&Number=728296&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=0&fpart=<br /><br />Sorry, I saw this thread just after I had posted mine and refreshed my browser. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font size="1"><span style="font-weight:bold" class="Apple-style-span">-----------------</span></font></p><p><font size="1"><span style="font-weight:bold" class="Apple-style-span">The Meridiani Journal</span><br />a chronicle of planetary exploration<br />web.me.com/meridianijournal</font> </p> </div>

 

[thermionic]

Extraordinary! The article talks about the oceans having been gone for one or two billion years. That leaves an earlier billion or two years during which they were present. Life flaired here, what, 3.5Byears ago? Mars' oceans would have been present during that period, and for quite a while after.

 

[3488]

I wonder if CRISM on MRO will look at the 'shorelines'?<br /><br />If true, than for about a third of the time Mars has existed, Mars had a great deal of <br />surface liquid water.<br /><br />How does this fit in with the MER B Opportunity data in Meridiani, or the Mars Pathfinder data <br />in Ares Vallis??<br /><br />I am also interested to know, if volcanic activity, kept the martian atmosphere dense enough, <br />to prevent the oceans from boiling dry <br />& enough CO2 was emitted to create a greenhouse effect, to prevent the oceans from freezing.<br /><br />Andrew Brown. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font color="#000080">"I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before".</font> <em><strong><font color="#000000">Linda Morabito </font></strong><font color="#800000">on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.</font></em></p><p><font size="1" color="#000080">http://www.launchphotography.com/</font><br /><br /><font size="1" color="#000080">http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearth</font></p><p><font size="1" color="#000080">http://web.me.com/meridianijournal</font></p> </div>

 

[lost_shaman]

That is interesting. It seems as if the insinuation is that the (uneven) cooling mantel caused the shift.<br /><br />That seems logical because, unlike familiar water Ice, other materials are denser as Solids. Thus the first and subsequent Solidified Mantel should migrate towards the equator (<i>draging the floating crust along with it</i>).

 

[enigma10]

If the process of water leaving the surface of Mars was a gradual one, then it could stand to reason the probability of life still being present somewhere within the crust would be high, if the planet ever harbored life at all. Of course, what could be even more interesting is if we've re-introduced life to the planet already.<img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <em>"<font color="#333399">An organism at war with itself is a doomed organism." - Carl Sagan</font></em> </div>

 

[3488]

If the solidifying Mantle caused the rotational axis to shift, & made Mars more 'spherical',<br />would this mass concentration, be (particularly when the rotational period of Mars <br />slowed) detected by orbiters?<br /><br />However, this would explain why the 'shorelines' are at very different elevations.<br /><br />Fascinating stuff.<br /><br />Please see this post & image by rlb2.<br /><br />Hi Enigma10.<br /><br />Yes indeed. It looks as if the ocean was around for some considerable time.<br />If life did start, than it would have had time to evolve, as Mars became drier & colder.<br />Perhaps there are endoliths still there now.<br /><br />I am doubtful though. Whilst I would love to thinlk that microbial life may still be there <br />on Mars, I doubt it.<br /><br />Andrew Brown. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font color="#000080">"I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before".</font> <em><strong><font color="#000000">Linda Morabito </font></strong><font color="#800000">on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.</font></em></p><p><font size="1" color="#000080">http://www.launchphotography.com/</font><br /><br /><font size="1" color="#000080">http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearth</font></p><p><font size="1" color="#000080">http://web.me.com/meridianijournal</font></p> </div>

 

[dragon04]

I have a question that's semi-related to the topic.<br /><br />If mars had tectonic plates, would we not see evidence of them in a very obvious manner?<br /><br />If we instantly evaporated all of Earth's water and took a snapshot of the Earth, huge features like the Mid-Atlantic Ridge would be immediate evidence of past or current tectonic activity on Earth.<br /><br />That seems to be curiously absent from any images of Mars that I've ever seen. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <em>"2012.. Year of the Dragon!! Get on the Dragon Wagon!".</em> </div>

 

[jaxtraw]

I don't see how you can move a plate without obvious signs of upwelling filling in the gap between plates; i.e. like our mid-oceanic trenches. Strip the water away from Earth and they'd be obvious, dominant features. As the OP said, there don't seem to be any features like that on Mars, anywere.<br /><br />Looks to me like there's somethign weird about Earth that gives us plate tectonics. There's not a sign of it anywhere else we've looked in the solar system, even on our "twin", Venus.