Mars may have water after all thanks to its super salty soil, according to research published this week in the journal Nature Geoscience.
Using data collected by NASA's Curiosity rover, researchers concluded that salt in Mars' soil lowers the freezing point of water just enough to allow small amounts of liquid to condense below the planet's surface at night; in the morning, as temperatures rise, it evaporates. However, the finding does not mean Mars is capable of sustaining life.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Why more and more adults are reaching for soft toysUnder The Radar Does the popularity of the Squishmallow show Gen Z are 'scared to grow up'?
-
Magazine solutions - December 27, 2024 / January 3, 2025Puzzles and Quizzes Issue - December 27, 2024 / January 3, 2025
-
Magazine printables - December 27, 2024 / January 3, 2025Puzzles and Quizzes Issue - December 27, 2024 / January 3, 2025
-
US won its war on 'murder hornets,' officials saySpeed Read The announcement comes five years after the hornets were first spotted in the US
-
Dark energy data suggest Einstein was rightSpeed Read Albert Einstein's 1915 theory of general relativity has been proven correct, according to data collected by the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument
-
New DNA tests of Pompeii dead upend popular storiesSpeed Read An analysis of skeletal remains reveals that some Mount Vesuvius victims have been wrongly identified
-
NASA's Europa Clipper blasts off, seeking an oceanSpeed Read The ship is headed toward Jupiter on a yearslong journey
-
Detailed map of fly's brain holds clues to human mindSpeed Read This remarkable fruit fly brain analysis will aid in future human brain research
-
Blind people will listen to next week's total eclipseSpeed Read While they can't see the event, they can hear it with a device that translates the sky's brightness into music
-
Melting polar ice is messing with global timekeepingSpeed Read Ice loss caused by climate change is slowing the Earth's rotation
-
An amphibian that produces milk?speed read Caecilians, worm-like amphibians that live underground, produce a milk-like substance for their hatchlings
