A team of Italian scientists has found the strongest evidence yet of liquid water on Mars.
The apparent reservoir of water was detected beneath the planet’s southern polar ice cap using radar on the European Space Agency’s Mars Express satellite.
Evidence suggests that about 4.3 billion years ago, Mars was a watery world like Earth, with a vast — albeit shallow — ocean covering half the planet. But the planet eventually lost its magnetic field, which stripped it of its atmosphere and liquid water.
Images of Mars today show a barren, dusty rock world. But scientists now know that Mars has quite a bit of water, in the form of ice. Each of the planet’s poles consist of both water ice and carbon dioxide ice (dry ice).
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