Mars is more Earth-like
Thursday, December 16, 2004
A news from Time of India:- worth sharing
SAN FRANCISCO: Pictures of Earth-like clouds were captured by Nasa's Mars rover on Wednesday. Reports also indicate that there's a rock that doesn't look like anything scientists have ever seen.
The Spirit rover, ambling through the Columbia Hills at the fringe of the Gusev crater, has uncovered a riot of rock forms and geochemical novelties, including a mineral called goethite, which had not been found on Mars before.
Goethite is common on Earth and forms only in the presence of water, though the water can be liquid, frozen or vaporous, said Goestar Klingelhoefer of the Johannes Gutenberg University in Germany. Rover scientists presented their latest findings here Monday at meeting of the American Geophysical Union. A chunk of terrestrial goethite about the size of a can of tomato soup, passed around during a press conference, was black and shiny.
Other findings suggest the rocks of Columbia Hills have a history that included either a meteorite impact or volcanic activity, and that water was involved at some point.
Cornell astronomer Steven Squyres, principle investigator for the rover science instruments, said that just this weekend the team spotted a type of rock never seen before.
Scientists haven't yet analysed it and Squyres wouldn't speculate on what it was. But he noted that the exposed rocks of the Columbia Hills, thought to be billions of years old, reveal an extremely complex structure and range of mineral types. "We're stunned by the diversity of rocks," Squyres said.
