Water on Mars was once widespread and long-lasting, providing environments with the potential to support life, a new study finds.
Previously, scientists had strong evidence that liquid water chemically altered the Red Planet’s crust at certain times and locations. Those locations hold the mineral traces of water and preserve in the rock the planet’s past organic chemistry, says Scott Murchie, co-author of the new paper published in the July 17 Nature.
Those locations are also “really important” because the rocks there could hold possible evidence of past life, says Murchie, of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md.