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Mineral Hints at Martian Life

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Mineral Hints at Martian Life
Reuters 

5:59pm  27.May.98.PDT
A Martian mineral deposit 300 miles wide may contain clues to one of 
astronomy's persistent puzzles: Did the red planet once sustain life? 
A huge deposit of the mineral hematite has led to speculation that there 
was water on Mars long enough for life to form. 

The hematite deposit "is really the first evidence we have that hot 
water was around ... long enough for a geological period of time so that 
potentially life could have had an opportunity to form," Arizona State 
University Professor Phil Christensen told reporters at an American 
Geophysical Union meeting in Boston on Wednesday. 

Hematite is an iron oxide mineral that forms by a variety of ways that 
often involve water. On Earth, the coarse-grained mineral occurs around 
volcanic regions such as Yellowstone National Park. It is evidence that 
a large-scale hydrothermal system operated beneath the Martian surface, 
said the scientists working on the Mars Global Surveyor Mission. 

"If you want to find out about possible life on Mars, the deposit is a 
good place to start," Christensen said. "You've got water, you've got 
heat, got energy. It's a good place if you want to have life." 

David Smith of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center said a laser altimeter 
aboard the satellite orbiting above Mars mapped the topography. In 
April, it discovered new information about the planet's north polar cap 
and its surrounding features, including dune fields that share similar 
properties to North Africa's sand dunes. 

The instrument also revealed the presence of high-altitude clouds above 
the polar cap. Now in the midst of winter, the polar cap has expanded. 
"We want to watch it closely during the summer -- another 18 months or 
so -- to see what happens to both the cap and the clouds," Smith said. 

Another researcher, Michael Malin, whose company makes cameras for 
NASA's Mars mission, displayed a new composite photograph of a crater 25 
miles wide and 1 mile to 1.5 miles deep, about 3,600 miles south of the 
Martian equator. The deep, dark area near the middle of the crater 
appeared to be a frozen pond and there was evidence of seepage as well, 
Smith said. 

"It's like a dry lake," he said. 

The scientists are trying to determine what Mars was like 3 billion 
years ago and that is where the evidence of water and mineral deposits 
come into play. 

"Because the minerals were formed a long time ago, they're evidence of 
what the environment was like a long time ago," Christensen said. "We're 
expecting to find more. This is really just the tip of the iceberg."