Locating Ice on Mars With NASA’s New Map #SpaceSaturday

Locating Ice on Mars With NASA’s New Map #SpaceSaturday

Time Stamp: October 28, 2023 3:21 PM
Source Node: 2959593

The eixstence of ice on mars was once based on about as much observational data as the existene of canals or martians on our neighboring planet. Now, it seems likely that there is ice beneath the surface of the red planet. What’s more, ice on Mars wouldn’t just be an interesting fact, it could help sustain the first settlers. Here’s more from NASA:

The need to look for subsurface ice arises because liquid water isn’t stable on the Martian surface: The atmosphere is so thin that water immediately vaporizes. There’s plenty of ice at the Martian poles – mostly made of water, although carbon dioxide, or dry ice, can be found as well – but those regions are too cold for astronauts (or robots) to survive for long.

That’s where the NASA-funded Subsurface Water Ice Mapping project comes in. SWIM, as it’s known, recently released its fourth set of maps – the most detailed since the project began in 2017.

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