CCTV News: China's first Mars rover, Zhurong, landed in the southern part of the Utopian Plain on May 15, 2021. The Mars subsurface penetration radar it carries is used to detect underground structures and possible water ice. Recently, the reporter learned from the Institute of Aerospace Information Innovation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences that my country's scientific research team used the latest research of the "Zhurong" Mars rover to confirm that there were oceans on Mars. So what are the main research results? What does it mean that once had liquid water on Mars? A reporter from the General Office interviewed the main research team of the project.
Martian subsurface sediments are highly similar to those on Earth
According to the team's research, the geological characteristics located 10-35 meters deep underground in the northern hemisphere of Mars are highly similar to those on the Earth's coast, providing the most direct underground evidence to date for the existence of ancient oceans in the middle and low latitudes of Mars.
Liquid water is one of the basic conditions for the existence of life, which shows that Mars may have had an environment suitable for the origin and development of life. In particular, the coastal sediments we found proved that water has existed for a considerable period of time."
Research team: A variety of factors have caused the disappearance of Martian oceans
So, why did Mars' oceans eventually disappear? Will there be life on Mars?
Liu Hai said: "There are many possibilities for Mars to lose its oceans, including weakening of the magnetic field, causing the atmosphere to be stripped by the solar wind, and weakening of the activity of the nuclear part of Mars. These factors may jointly lead to the transformation of Mars from warm and humid to cold and dry. According to existing research results, there is currently no conclusive evidence that Mars once had life."
Provide possibilities for future water resource utilization at Mars base
The greatest significance of this discovery is that if Mars once had oceans, then with climate change, a large amount of water may be sealed in the form of underground ice, providing possibilities for future water resource utilization at Mars base.
Liu Hai said: "In the next step, we will focus on analyzing the surface of the Mars rover of the Zhurong Mars to obtain richer underground scattering information, and have a more detailed understanding of the geological structural characteristics of the shallow underground surface of Mars."
