About this episode
This episode discusses the surprising findings of dark streaks on Mars that may be related to dry granular flows rather than liquid water.
The NASA Curiosity Rover has shown us evidence of ancient rivers and bodies of liquid water on the martian surface. Given it's thin cold atmosphere, seeps of liquid water, presently on the surface of Mars which are capable of hosting microbial life appear to be unlikely. Scientists were thus surprised when high resolution imaging of the red planet's surface revealed thousands of intriguing dark streaks called RSL on hundreds of rocky slope areas. These fascinating features slowly extend down hill and grow during the martian warm season, fade during the colder season, and reappear during the next martian warm period. On Earth features like these are produced by seeps of liquid water. However, on Mars a careful study of 151 RSL features at ten different sites using the high resolution camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter reveal that they occur almost entirely on slopes which are greater than 27 degrees. This new research published in Nature Geoscience suggests that RSL are composed of solid particles in dry granular flows which unlike water seeps appear to end on many of the dunes when it's slope falls below a critical value. What makes RSL tick remains a mystery and likely…
People in this episode
Host: Albert D. Grauer
Topics covered
- Mars exploration
- Curiosity Rover
- liquid water
- microbial life
- RSL features
- geology
Keywords
- Mars
- Curiosity Rover
- RSL
- liquid water
- microbial life
- Nature Geoscience
- geology
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: NASA, Nature Geoscience
Products: Curiosity Rover
Places: Mars, Earth
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