SYDNEY, Nov. 23 (Xinhua) — Australian researchers have discovered the earliest direct evidence of a source of hot water on Mars. This suggests that the planet may once have been a place where life could exist.
In the study published on Saturday (November 23), a team led by researchers from Curtin University in Western Australia. analysis of 4.45 billion year old zircon grains from the famous meteorite NWA7034 from Mars, nicknamed “Black Beauty” Found in the Sahara Desert in 2011
Researchers found that mineral grains zircon which is a type of mineral There are geochemical signs of water-rich fluids. This shows that there was water when the Martian magma began to move.
Co-author of the study, Aaron Cavosi, is from the university’s Faculty of Geology and Planetary Sciences. He said this discovery will be a way to understand hot water systems. (aqueous systems) of ancient Mars as well as the possibility of past life on this planet.
Cavosi said we used nanoscale geochemistry to find elemental evidence of hot water on Mars 4.45 billion years ago.
In addition, Cavosi said, hot water systems are essential for the development of life on Earth. And our results indicate that Mars also had water in the earliest history of the formation of the planet’s crust. Water is an important part of the living environment.
Cavosi said that even the crust of Mars was hit by a meteorite so violently that it caused the surface to move. But the results show that there was water on Mars before the Noachian period. (Pre-Noachian) at the beginning, about 4.1 billion years ago.
