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The images are impressively detailed, but first impression is probaby. Water? How do they know from a picture of a cliff? Water has been confirmed by spectrosc
by daveguy 9y ago
The images are impressively detailed, but first impression is probaby. Water? How do they know from a picture of a cliff?
Water has been confirmed by spectroscopy, thermal imaging and (previously) radar.
From the article:
"Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM) confirmed that the bright material is frozen water. A check of the surface temperature using Odyssey's Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS) camera helped researchers determine they're not seeing just thin frost covering the ground.
Researchers previously used MRO's Shallow Radar (SHARAD) to map extensive underground water-ice sheets in middle latitudes of Mars and estimate that the top of the ice is less than about 10 yards beneath the ground surface."
- kurthr 9y agoI agree, the SHARAD work was amazing to use mixed mode Radar to image the subsurface ice tomographically (by reconstructing synthetic aperture radar from multiple passes of 2? different radar frequencies from many orbits with limited antenna time). This is really the first time frozen water (not just frost) has been SEEN with an imaging spectrometer!