They are "green" Mars!

Text ｜ Li Muzi

The recognized Martian scene is red rocks and meteorites seen by the naked eye.

This is exactly what the scientist expects to see when the "Perseverance" Mars car landing in the Jezeo meteorite pit.

When there is liquid water, air, and magnetic field on Mars, the crater was once a lake and part of the river system.

The "perseverance" Mars cars seeing the sights on a boulder on the Jezuro meteorite pit. Picture source: NASA

However, the discovery of the Mars car on the ground is shocking: Many rocks are not expected sedimentary rocks (washed and accumulated at the bottom of the lake by the river), but fire.

Specifically, they are composed of a turbid, less like gemstone olives, and the latter dyes many beaches of Hawaii into dark green, and on Mars, it becomes green sand.

Roger Wiens and Associate Professor Briony Horgan played an important role in the discovery and analysis of Martian rock data.

Related studies have recently published in "Scientific Progress".

Wieens leaders designed and built a super camera to help analyze rock samples and determine its type and source. Horgan chose the Jezuro meteorite pit as the landmark of Mars and used the Mastcam-Z camera to persist in capturing related geological data.

"The layers of fire we see are different from the earth today." Wieens said, "They are very similar to the early fire of the earth."

The rocks and lava detected by Mars have a history of nearly 4 billion years. But on the earth, similar rocks have been weathered and broken.

"The reason why we couldn't understand when the original life on the earth was evolved. One of the reasons was that most of the rocks had disappeared at that time, so it was difficult to rebuild the ancient environment of the earth." Horgan said, "'' '' The rock discovered by Perseverance 'has existed for billions of years on the surface of Mars. This is why Mars is an important laboratory to understand the early solar system. "

"We see these rocks with beautiful rock formations, so they think they are sedimentary rocks." Horgan said, "It wasn't until we observed it at the millimeter scale that they knew that they were not sedimentary rocks, but ancient lava. Related detection tools installed on Mars. "

These equipment and innovative instruments are helping the "perseverance" to complete the task in an unprecedented way. This also proves the necessity of the detector on the surface of Mars, which facilitates scientists to investigate and understand what happened on Mars.

Related thesis information:

http://doi.org/10.1126/sclence.abo2196

"China Science News" (2022-08-31 The 2nd edition of the original title "Mars Discovery Green Sand")

Edit | Zhao Lu

Capture | Guo Gang

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