With more than 8 billion humans, our planet is starting to become small, and studies for a second home are pouring in. For now, the first in line to welcome humans is the planet Mars, “only” 54.6 million kilometers from Earth. But is it even viable? In other words, has there ever been water on Mars, a necessary condition for life?
For decades, the theory that an ocean covered up to a third of the Red Planet billions of years ago has been debated among scientists. In 2021, the Chinese robot Zhurong landed on a plain in the Utopia region, in the northern hemisphere of Mars. Since then, he has explored the corners of the planet in search of clues and discoveries. Recently, according to an article from ScienceAlertZhurong reportedly found new evidence supporting the theory that Mars once had an ocean.
The mission report was written and published in the journal Scientific Reports on November 7, 2024 by Professor Bo Wu, Hong Kong Polytechnic University. He told AFP that several features linked to a possible ancient ocean had been spotted around the Zhurong landing zone. He speaks in particular of “pitted cones, polygonal hollows and flow marks”.
An ancient marked coastline
Previous research suggested that pitted cone-like craters may have come from mud volcanoes, and that they were often formed in areas where there was water or ice. According to the new report, information from the robot, satellite data and analyzes on Earth suggest that there was also a shoreline near this same area. Scientists assume that the ocean was created by a huge flood about 3.7 billion years ago. According to their scenario, the ocean then froze, scarring a coastline before disappearing just over 3.4 billion years ago.
However, Bo Wu points out that he and his team of scientists “do not claim that (the) results definitively prove that there was an ocean on Mars”. Martian rocks should be brought back to Earth to examine them, before making any allegations. Because for Benjamin Cardenas, of Pennsylvania State University (United States), who has analyzed other evidence of a possible Martian ocean, this new study leaves him “skeptical”.
He believes that Bo Wu’s team did not sufficiently take into account the Martian winds that may have moved sediments and worn away rocks over the past billion years. Professor Wu acknowledges that wind may have played a role, but says meteorites can also “extracting underground sediments and rocks to the surface from time to time”. If Benjamin Cardenas is not necessarily convinced by this latest report, he still admits “to think that there was an ocean on Mars”.
Unraveling this mystery will perhaps answer one of the biggest scientific questions: whether Earth is the only planet in the solar system capable of supporting life. If not, prepare your bags because Elon Musk has already planned a “space ark” which will aim to take us to the planet Mars.
Source: www.slate.fr
