2024-08-18 06:42:31
The water reserve is hidden in small cracks and pores of the rocks in the Martian crust, at depths ranging from 11.5 to 20 kilometers, making it practically unreachable for future human explorers.
The discovery and its impact
The discovery was made by an international team of geophysicists who used seismic data collected by NASA’s InSight mission, which was active on Mars between 2018 and 2022. This data allowed scientists to identify a vast underground water deposit, so extensive that it could cover the entire surface of Mars with an ocean between one and two kilometers deep. This sensational finding, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, sheds light on the mystery of where the Martian water went, which was thought to have been lost to space.
Obstacles to colonization
Despite the magnitude of this discovery, the location of this water at extreme depths beneath the Martian crust makes it practically unreachable for any current human efforts. Even on Earth, accessing water reserves at such depths would be a monumental task, and on Mars, with current technological and logistical limitations, it presents an almost insurmountable challenge.
This finding is undoubtedly a significant scientific achievement, as it offers new perspectives on Mars’s geological and climatic past. However, for future colonists hoping to utilize in-situ water resources, this discovery does not change the landscape much. The difficulty of extracting water from these depths means that settlers will continue searching for more accessible water sources, possibly in the form of ice at the poles or in more superficial deposits.
Implications for the search for life
Despite its inaccessibility, the discovery also opens a new avenue for the search for life on Mars. Water is essential for life as we know it, and although no direct evidence of life has been found on Mars, this underground deposit could provide a habitable environment, similar to the depths of the Earth, where life has been found in mines and at the bottom of the ocean. Scientists suggest that this water may have supported some form of life in the past, and perhaps it still could.
The next step in Martian exploration
This finding is just the beginning of a long research process. Scientists now face the challenge of determining how, if possible, this water could be accessed in the future. Meanwhile, the mission to understand the water cycle on Mars and its impact on the planet’s evolution continues. The big question now is whether we will ever be able to harness this lost water or if it will remain an inaccessible relic of Mars’s past.