Tag: Gale Crater

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A Detailed New Mapping of Where Mars Once Had Plentiful Water

NASA's long-time motto for exploring Mars has been "Follow the water."  That has changed some in recent years, as the presence of long-ago H2O has been confirmed in many locales around the planet.   Moving on, the motto today is more "Follow the organics" -- the carbon-based building blocks of life -- in the search for …

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How Long Were the Wet Periods on Early Mars, and Was That Water Chemically Suitable For Life?

  There is no doubt that early Mars had long period of warmer and much wetter climates before its atmosphere thinned too much to retain that liquid H20 on the surface. As we know from the Curiosity mission to Gale Crater and other orbital findings, regions of that warmer and wetter Mars had flowing water …

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