Mysteries of Mars

A unique black meteorite found in the Moroccan desert has turned out to have come from the planet Mars.Nicknamed "Black Beauty", the meteorite has a texture and chemistry that sets it apart from previous Martian meteorites and is believed to be just over two billion years old. Like other meteorites from Mars, this one would have originated at the site of an asteroid impact on the Red Planet, catapulting chunks of rock off in to space. Such finds are veryrare, only 100 or so meteorites from Mars have ever been found on the Earth."It has some resemblance to the other Martian meteorites but it"s also distinctly different in other respects, both in the way it just looks in hand sample, but also in its elemental composition." said study leader Carl Agee.

There is far more water in the new meteorite than in any others found from Mars suggesting water was a lot more abundant at the time it was formed. "This rock is from two billion years ago and a lot of theSNCs are from only about 200-400 million years ago," said Agee. A dark lump of rock found in the Moroccan desert in 2011 is a new type of Martian meteorite, say scientists.  

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Long-running rover Opportunity has come across an area of water-formed clay minerals on Mars.Opportunity has continued to exceed expectations, not least because it is still going after 8 years despite being designed to last only 90 days. Now it has discovered clay deposits that suggest the region it is in is a lot richer than scientists had believed. The clay minerals are significant becausethey suggest neutral water chemistry, indicating water clean enough to drink."If Opportunity can find a sample and give us a closer look, we should be able to determine how the rock was formed, such as in a deep lake, shallow pond or volcanic system," said planetary scientist James Wray.

NASA"s long-lived Mars rover Opportunity that beat newcomer sister probe Curiosity to an area containing water-formed clay minerals, has rolled into aregion that may be far richer than scientists first realized.  

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Scientists have run an experiment to grow bacteria in conditions designed to simulate those on Mars.While the search for alien life is mostly concerned with the search for conditions similar to those we see here on Earth, it is not a foregone conclusion that life couldn"t exist in environments that we would normally consider inhospitable. NASA scientists have put this to the test by creating alow-atmospheric-pressure environment here on Earth in which to simulate the conditions on Mars.

The results indicated that even common bacteria were able to survive under the simulated conditions and that other microbes that have evolved to survive in extreme environments would fare even better. "Just because the planet doesn’t have a large atmosphere, we don’t have to dismiss it right away as non-habitable," said team leader Alexander Pavlov. Scientists have grown bacteria in a very low-atmospheric-pressure environment, similar to the surface of Mars.  

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Curiosity is to be joined on Mars by a second rover based on the same design as its predecessor.The success of Curiosity has spurred on plans to launch a second rover of the same type in 2020. Most of the technologies from the first mission will be used again including NASA"s rocket-powered crane landing system which was tested on Mars for the first time when Curiosity landed back in August. The new rover however will beequipped with new science instruments and land at a different location on the Red Planet to expand upon research opportunities for scientists.Because the design has already been successfully tested and thanks to the availability of several spare components including a nuclear battery, the new rover will be quicker and cheaper to produce than its predecessor with a budget of $1.5 billion as oppose to the $2.5 billion spent on Curiosity.

The US space agency (Nasa)says it will launch a new rover to Mars in 2020. The vehicle will be based on its Curiosity robot, which landed on the Red Planet in August.  

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