"There's an accumulation of liquid water beneath Mars' south polar ice cap" an international team of researchers has found new proof for the potential existence of liquid water beneath the south polar ice cap of Mars. The results, printed in the journal Nature Astronomy, offer the primary independent line of evidence, using the information except for radar, that there's liquid water beneath Mars' south pole.

The researchers, led by the University of Cambridge with involvement from the University of Sheffield, used spacecraft laser-altimeter measurements of the form of the upper surface of the ice cap to spot subtle patterns in its height. They then showed that these patterns match computer model predictions for the way a body of water beneath the ice cap would affect the surface. Their results are in agreement with earlier ice-penetrating measuring device measurements that were originally understood to point out a possible space of liquid water beneath the ice. There has been dialogue over the liquid water interpretation from the radar information alone, with some studies suggesting the radar signal isn't thanks to liquid water. "This study provides the best indication yet that there's liquid water on Mars these days because it means that 2 of the key items of proof we might seek for once looking for sub-glacial lakes on Earth have currently been found on Mars," aforementioned Frances Butcher, second author of the study from the University of Sheffield. "Liquid water is a vital ingredient for life, though it doesn't essentially mean that life exists on Mars," Butcher said. To be liquid, however, not like Earth's ice sheets that are underlain by water-filled channels and even giant subglacial lakes, the polar ice caps on Mars have recently been thought to be frozen solid to their beds due to the cold Martian climate. In 2018, proof from the

European Space Agency's Mars Express satellite challenged this assumption. The satellite has an ice-penetrating radar known as MARSIS, which may see through Mars' southern ice cap. It discovered a region at the bottom of the ice that powerfully mirrored the radar signal, which was understood as an area of liquid water beneath the ice cap. However, subsequent studies recommended that alternative varieties of dry materials, which exist elsewhere on Mars, might produce similar patterns of reflectance if they exist beneath the ice cap. Given the cold climate conditions, liquid water beneath the ice cap would need a further heat source, such as geothermal heat from among the planet, at levels on top of those expected for current-day Mars. "The combination of the new topographic evidence, our computer model results, and also the radar information build it way more likely that a minimum of one area of subglacial liquid water exists on Mars today, which Mars should still be geothermally active to stay the water beneath the ice cap liquid," aforementioned prof Neil Arnold from Cambridge' Scott Polar analysis Institute, who diode the research. On Earth, subglacial lakes affect the form of the superjacent ice sheet - it's surface topography. The water in subglacial lakes lowers friction between the ice sheet and its bed, affecting the speed of ice flow under gravity.

This in turn affects the shape of the ice sheet surface on top of the lake, usually making a depression within the ice surface followed by a raised space for any down-flow. The team, as well as researchers from the University of Nantes, University College, Dublin, and also the Open University, used a variety of techniques to examine the information from NASA's Mars international Surveyor satellite of the surface topography of the part of Mars' south polar ice cap wherever the radar signal was identified. at such cold temperatures, the researchers noted that the water beneath the South Pole would possibly have to be salty, which might build it troublesome for any microbial life to inhabit it. However, it does provide hope that there have been a lot of livable environments in the past once the climate was less unforgiving, they said. Like Earth, Mars has thick water ice caps at both poles, roughly equivalent in combined volume to the Greenland Ice Sheet.