The study of the Gale crater on Mars with the Curiosity apparatus convinced the scientists that this place was once filled with water. However, the question automatically arose – whether it was running, liquid water, or in the conditions of ancient Mars, it could only exist in the form of ice and snow? The answer was unexpectedly found on Earth, in the edge of ice and geysers – Iceland.
The Curiosity Mars -Road cannot rise from the Gale crater high to the mountains, advance through the channels of ancient rivers, so we have to study what is below – bottom deposits and sedimentary rocks. At first, they put scientists in a dead end, since the blur of rock fragments is barely expressed, and the deposits are full of small fractions and minerals, which the water had to wash for a long time. However, this did not happen, which led to the idea – if the rivers were seething on Mars, then only a small part of the year. Everything indicates low planetary temperatures, on the verge of freezing water.
Gale crater today
Researchers from the University of Rice began to look for similar places on Earth, for which they visited Antarctica, Hawaii and Iceland. It is in Iceland, where there are many basalt rocks and the average annual temperature does not exceed 3 ℃, they discovered slow streams, the channels of which are very reminiscent of the surface of the gale crater. Based on these data, it was concluded that 3 billion years ago, Mars was the world of ice, which fluctuated between the Antarctic cold and the Icelandic thaw.
Modern Iceland – this is what Crater Gale looked like 3 billion years ago
Source — JGR Planets