NASA: Mars Curiosity rover finds rocky signs of once-gushing stream

[bananas]

Source: Los Angeles Times

NASA’s Curiosity rover has found evidence of strong streams that once gushed across the Martian surface, mission scientists said Thursday.

Curiosity landed in Gale Crater on Aug. 5. But now, less than a couple of months into the Mars Science Laboratory’s two-year mission, the Red Planet rover used its Mast Camera to examine rocks on its way to Glenelg Intrigue. Glenelg has caught scientists’ eyes because the odd spot serves as a junction between three different types of terrain.

The two outcrops in between, named Link and Hottah, have provided some exciting results in the meantime. The mission’s head scientist, Caltech geologist John Grotzinger, described the outcrop at Hottah as a raised cement section in a ”jackhammered urban sidewalk,” possibly caused by an impact on the surface.

The telltale rocks are made of sandy rock riddled with large pebbles. The shape of those pebbles tells the scientists that the rocks must have traveled a long way, bumping into each other and smoothing out the rough edges. The relatively large size of many of those stones – some the size of a golf ball – tells them that water, not wind, must have carried them.

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Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-mars-rover-gushing-water-stream-curiosity-20120927,0,1428281.story

[heaven05]

1. oh good

let's all go there. this one is done for anyway. We have another to 'conquer' and settle.

[Frank Cannon]

6. I love this stuff. I live for it.

Over the last forty years since the last moon landing, if we'd spent as much money on science and space exploration as we spent on bullshit wars in the Middle East, we'd have colonies on at least one other world and be working out how to make it out of this solar system.

[Posteritatis]

8. And 59 minutes before the standard misanthrope hijack attempt. Not quite a record.. (nt)

[heaven05]

19. hey

you're entitled human. I base my judgement on precedent behavior of humans who have made a mess of the planet earth. You remember that planet don't you? It's the one where some people said global warming was a lie. Tell that to the polar bears, at least they can't talk back to someone like you. Tipping points are real. Every time I start my little 95' 300 thousand mile honda up I become ashamed at having to take part in the destruction of my planet, something I am sure you or the other one making fun of me never thought of. I don't care what you say about my original post. All, let me repeat, all we will do if we colonize mars or any other habitable planet is destroy it in the name of profit and so-called human technological progress. Take your misanthropic, misleading statement to the arctic and just sit there for a few weeks. I don't, I repeat, DON'T care what you say about my opinion.

[Occulus]

24. Mars is a lifeless, cold, barren desert.

There's nothing there to destroy, and your entire argument is therefore pointless.

[heaven05]

25. sure

you missed my point which isn't hard for me to understand. have a good one.

[leveymg]

26. Which, no doubt, we will change by the very microbes we bring with us.

For better or for worse. The fact that we are even having this debate is an encouraging sign that humans are smart enough to, at least, start to contemplate their own potential for creation or destruction before we do it.

[Odin2005]

15. Why did I know the first post would be misanthropic BS?

[heaven05]

20. you too

refer to answer to prostatitis.

[randome]

2. Yay!

We've spent how many hundreds of millions of dollars for 'proof' that there 'may have been' water (maybe) in 'great' (or possibly not) quantities at one time in Mars' remote past (or possibly sooner or later).

This crap is the same thing every fucking time. It's long past time to send a team of real people out there.

[OnlinePoker]

9. 40 - 50% of humans get cancer in their lifetime

As long as the crew is volunteer and know there is the increased risk of cancer, I don't think you would have a hard time finding people to make the journey. Exploration has always carried a degree of risk and going to other planets will be no different.

[tavalon]

14. I think that person might be saying they'll be dead before they get there

[daleo]

27. If there was a bad solar storm, they could get a massive dose of radiation

Though it may be possible to build a refuge that they could hide within, on a Mars bound spacecraft.

The journey would be no picnic.

[slackmaster]

16. The solution is to send middle-aged people rather than young ones

They have less time to live naturally, so less years of their lives would be lost to cancer.

[Posteritatis]

22. We just need to clone that Russian Antarctic doc who performed his own appendectomy. (nt)

[Starboard Tack]

23. Send lots of them. Some might make it.

Of course, we might not make it back. Ah well.

[Kolesar]

11. When aluminum is hit with cosmic rays, it generates secondary radiation that is even more deadly.

Zapped enroute and zapped on the surface, because, IIRC, Mars does not have a magnetic field to protect lifeforms from the Sun's radiation.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

3. From JPL

[img][/img]

Closeup view:

[img][/img]

[itsrobert]

5. Gold Rush Mars

The Hoffmans are risking it all to find the mother-lode on Mars. Jack Hoffman (the senior Hoffman) just knows their gold in that old Martian riverbed. He feels it in his blood. His son, Todd Hoffman scours the government auction sites in hope of picking an old spacecraft on the cheap. Todd's plan is risky, but if the Hoffman's strike pay-dirt, it will make them rich.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

7. Martian SOIL at this point would be worth it's weight in terrestrial gold.

I can just imagine some private company bringing back a pathogen that wipes out all life on earth.

[lunatica]

13. Those really do look like chunks of concrete which have been jackhammered

It's amazing to be seeing photos of the terrain on another planet. I remember when sputnik was launched in 1957. I was nine years old. It could have happened a lot faster, but still, it's exciting to see these photos.

[Rhiannon12866]

10. K&R! Fascinating stuff!

[Berlum]

12. "Please don't let Republicans screw up Barsoom like they have screwed up Earth." - John Carter

[TrogL]

21. If it looks like a sidewalk, it must be a sidewalk

Proof of intelligent life on Mars!!!!!

Hey, if it's good enough for the truthers, it's good enough for me.

[daleo]

28. A sign of truly intelligent life would be a bike path. n/t