New discoveries have been made in China's "Zhurong"! Ancient oceans once existed in the middle and low latitudes of Mars
The reporter learned from the Institute of Aerospace Information Innovation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences that the research team of the moon and Mars exploration radar led by researcher Fang Guangyou of the institute found that there were multi-layered inclined sedimentary structures 10 to 35 meters underground in the Zhurong landing area in the southern part of the Utopian Plain in the northern hemisphere of Mars. These geological characteristics are highly similar to Earth's coastal sediments, providing the most direct underground evidence to date for the existence of ancient oceans in the middle and low latitudes of Mars. The results were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) on February 25, 2025 Beijing time.
Mars is regarded by scientists as the preferred target of human interstellar migration because of its similar geological characteristics, seasonal changes and circadian rhythms to Earth. Human exploration of Mars has achieved many milestones in the past few decades, but most of these discoveries are concentrated in high latitudes or polar regions of Mars where the environment is extremely cold, and debate over whether there has ever been a vast ocean in the northern lowlands of Mars has always existed, making it crucial to obtain direct evidence of the Martian ancient ocean.
△The imaginary map of Mars 3.6 billion years ago. The blue area shows the now-disappeared ancient ocean and coastline of Deuteronilus. The orange star represents the landing point of the Zhurong rover in China. The yellow star is the landing point of the NASA Perseverance rover (Photo source: Robert Citron)
China's first Mars rover, Zhurong, landed in the southern part of the Utopian Plain on May 15, 2021. It is equipped with the Mars subsurface penetration radar developed by the Institute of Aerospace Information Innovation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, for detection of underground structures and possible water ice. The route of Zhurong is about 280 kilometers north of the ancient ocean coastline that the previous generations proposed possible, and is about 500 meters lower than the coastline at an altitude.
