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Two years ago, astronomers reported findings of a large lake beneath a thick layer of ice at the south pole of Mars. Now, scientists have confirmed that they have found and detected three new underground lakes in the same area, and they believe there could be many more.
A new study, published this week in the journal Nature Astronomy, further confirms the 2018 discovery, extending that finding to three new ponds in the surrounding region. The researchers used radar data from the European Space Agency’s Mars Express spacecraft, studying a data set of 134 observations between 2012-2019.
To detect the lakes, a radar instrument on Mars Express sent radio waves to the surface of the red planet, which were then reflected in a certain way depending on the material present there. A similar method is used to find subglacial lakes on Earth.
The high reflectivity detected by the team of researchers suggests that there are large masses of liquid water trapped below the surface.
“The possibility of extended hypersaline bodies of water on Mars is particularly exciting because of the potential for microbial life,” the team said. “Future missions to Mars should target this region to acquire experimental data regarding the basal hydrological system, its chemistry and traces of astrobiological activity.”
The largest lake found is about 19 miles wide and is surrounded by several smaller ponds. Researchers believe the water is salty, allowing it to remain liquid even in the freezing temperatures of Mars.
Very high salt content could mean no life is present.
“There is not much active life in these salty pools in Antarctica,” John Priscu, an environmental scientist at Montana State University in Bozeman, whose group studies microbiology in icy environments, told Nature. “They’re just pickled. And that could be the case. [on Mars]. “
Scientists believe the findings indicate the possibility of a much larger network of ancient underground lakes, which could be millions or even billions of years old, when Mars was warmer and more humid, like Earth.
Currently, water cannot remain stable on the surface of Mars due to the lack of a substantial atmosphere, but the presence of liquid water on Mars means that there is potential for life. Subglacial lakes allow researchers to examine how life can survive in extreme environments, but reaching them is incredibly difficult because they are buried a mile under an ice sheet.
“There can be a lot of water on Mars,” said study co-author Elena Pettinelli, a planetary scientist at the University of Rome. “And if there was water, there was the possibility of life.”
But not everyone is convinced by the data. Mike Sori, a planetary geophysicist at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, told Nature: “If the glowing material really is liquid water, I think it’s more likely to represent some kind of mud or mud.”
