To Understand Mars’s Water, Look to Antarctica

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When Alfred McEwen tells you a place on Mars has warm summers, don’t picture the Florida Keys—think Antarctica at its balmiest. McEwen, the lead scientist for the filing-cabinet-sized camera riding on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, took photos five years ago of dark, water-like trails on slopes where temperatures on summer days can sometimes reach the melting point of water. But to test to see if water really created the trails, the scientists needed more than ordinary photos. Full Article »

Water on Mars: Major Breakthrough or Another Day at the Office?

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It’s as if salty tears of joy are streaking Mars’ dusty face while the planet struggles to contain its emotion. A bit melodramatic? Perhaps, but news of water on Mars has recently grabbed the red planet an impressive amount of fanfare.

For a team of scientists, their finding was simply an incremental step in research confirming what they considered to be a forgone conclusion. But it quickly ballooned into a massive story that captured the public’s imagination. Full Article »

Oh, the weather on Mars was frightful

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Scope Correspondent

Between 3.5 and 4 billion years ago, water carved valleys into the Red Planet’s surface. But as planetary scientists try to understand the ancient Martian climate that caused this erosion, the answers from different scientific approaches don’t add up. Read the full story on NOVA Next.