SUDBURY -- NASA is one step closer to hopefully solving the "age-old" question as to whether life exists on Mars thanks to the work of one Laurentian University researcher.
Assistant Professor of Sedimentology at the Harquail School of Earth Science Alessandro Ielpi has published a paper along with co-author Stanford University's Mathieu Lapôtre that puts a new landing site on the red planet in a new spotlight.
"Most of the research that we've been doing is in the Great Basin of the southwestern U.S., which is a very arid area and there are some rivers there that essentially have no vegetation along their banks and we've been looking at those for quite some time for a number of reasons," said Ielpi.
According to the researcher, they began studying the rivers because they were similar to what rivers were like on Earth before the development of complex life.
"We have found a way to apply some of the observations that we have collected in the Great Basin of the U.S. to Mars to understand how rivers worked," Ielpi explained.
The hope is by taking a look at the flow rates of rivers on Earth when it comes to sediment, they'll be able to use those findings to find evidence of life in an area of Mars called the Jezero Delta.
Ielpi said that there is value in looking for potential signs of life in the link of river channels to the flux of river sediment they transported.
"We looked at rivers on Earth that might be analogous to rivers on Mars because of the environments in which they form. And understanding their dynamics, we're able to: one, make predictions on where we should look for organics and two, we were able to estimate the duration of flow events on Mars, which gives us confidence that it was indeed a habitable environment. So, we have the two ingredients here. We've established that Jezero was habitable and two if it was indeed inhabited, the rover is likely to find evidence because it would have been preserved in the rocks," said Lapôtre. "Certainly, the question of the earliest life in the solar system is one that's fascinated people for a long time and I do think that Mars is the best place to look for answers to that question so I'm excited."
The pair's paper, The Pace of Fluvial Meanders on Mars and Implications for the Western Delta Deposits of Jezero Crater, was published this week in AGU Advances by the American Geophysical Union and it contains a detailed breakdown of the Jezero landscape.
Among their findings, is recommendations on sampling strategies once the rover has landed and operational.
The paper also predicts that sediments in ancient rivers would have been buried quickly, favouring the long-term preservation of organic matter.
"Studies like ours reinforce the importance of core scientific research aimed, for example, at searching for signs of extraterrestrial life and investigation the habitability of other plants, even during adverse times such as the ones we find ourselves in," said Ielpi.
They're hopeful NASA will be able to employ the findings in the next rover mission slated to take off this summer, dubbed "Perseverance."
Perseverance will touch down in the Jezero craters on Mars on February 18, 2021, and its core mission will be to return rocks and soil samples to earth.
https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMidGh0dHBzOi8vbm9ydGhlcm5vbnRhcmlvLmN0dm5ld3MuY2EvbGF1cmVudGlhbi11bml2ZXJzaXR5LXJlc2VhcmNoZXItaGVscGluZy1uYXNhLXMtc2VhcmNoLWZvci1saWZlLW9uLW1hcnMtMS40OTEwMTk00gEA?oc=5
2020-04-24 14:26:00Z
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