Tech Shout!

NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover – A or Spirit, as it better known as, has analyzed a patch of Martian soil and found that it is very, very rich in silica. That’s important as it points that ancient Mars was much wetter than it is now.

A lot of water is required to make a concentrated deposit of silica, like the one that was studied by Spirit. It measured a composition of about 90 percent pure silica for this patch of Martian soil. The rover has a miniature thermal emission spectrometer that examined the patch and Steve Ruff of Arizona State University, Tempe observed that its spectrum confirmed high silica content. The place has been given the name, Gertrude Weise, after a player in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. The patch was in a low range of hills inside a Connecticut-sized basin named Gusev Crater.

“This is some of the best evidence Spirit has found for water at Gusev. One probable origin for the silica could have been interaction of soil with acid vapors produced by volcanic activity in the existence of water. Another could have been from water in a hot spring environment. The latest discovery adds convincing new evidence for ancient conditions that might have been encouraging for life, according to members of the rover science team,” said NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory geochemist Albert Yen .

Doug McCuistion, Director, NASA’s Mars Exploration Program says, “This surprising new discovery is a reminder that Spirit and Opportunity are still doing cutting-edge exploration more than three years into their extended missions. It also reinforces the fact that significant amounts of water were present in Mars’ past, which continues to spur the hope that we can show that Mars was once habitable and possibly supported life.”

The discovery took a long time as Spirit worked within about 50 yards of the Gertrude Weise area for more than eighteen months. Also, NASA could soon come out with more news as Mars Exploration Rover – B or Opportunity as it is called, is also exploring Victoria Crater for about eight months on the other side of Mars. Spirit landed on Mars on January 4, 2004, just three weeks before Opportunity rover joined it on the red planet.