Study suggests ocean may be beneath Mars' surface

SINGAPORE — A study released on Monday using data from NASA's Mars InSight lander shows evidence of liquid water far below the surface of the fourth planet, advancing the search for life there and showing what might have happened to Mars' ancient oceans.

The lander, which has been on the Red Planet since 2018, measured seismic data over four years, examining how quakes shook the ground and determining what materials or substances were beneath the surface.

Based on those data, researchers found liquid water was most likely present deep beneath the lander. Water is considered essential for life, and geological studies show the planet's surface had lakes, rivers and oceans more than 3 billion years ago.

"On Earth, what we know is where it is wet enough and there are enough sources of energy, there is microbial life very deep in Earth's subsurface," said Vashan Wright, one of the study's authors and an assistant professor at the University of California San Diego's Scripps Institution of Oceanography. "The ingredients for life as we know it exist in the Martian subsurface if these interpretations are correct."

The study found that large reservoirs of liquid water in fractures 11.5 kilometers to 20 km beneath the surface best explained the InSight measurements.

It said the volume of liquid water predicted beneath the surface is "more than the water volumes proposed to have filled hypothesized ancient Martian oceans".

"On Earth, groundwater infiltrated from the surface" to deep underground, Wright said. "We expect this process to have occurred on Mars as well when the upper crust was warmer than it is today."

The study was published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Agencies - Xinhua