liquid water tagged posts

Our familiar, warm, yellow sun is a relative rarity in the Milky Way. By far the most common stars are considerably smaller and cooler, sporting just half the mass of our sun at most. Billions of planets orbit these common dwarf stars in our galaxy. To capture enough warmth to be habitable, these planets would need to huddle very close to their small stars, which leaves them susceptible to extreme tidal forces.

In a new analysis based on the latest telescope data, University of Florida astronomers have discovered that two-thirds of the planets around these ubiquitous small stars could be roasted by these tidal extremes, sterilizing them...

Geophysical radar reflections, laboratory experiments point to slushy brines. A Southwest Research Institute scientist measured the properties of ice-brine mixtures as cold as -145 degrees Fahrenheit to help confirm that salty water likely exists between grains of ice or sediment under the ice cap at Mars’ south pole. Laboratory measurements conducted by SwRI geophysicist Dr...

A blue crystal recovered from a meteorite that fell near Morocco in 1998. The scale bar represents 200 microns (millionths of a meter). Credit: Queenie Chan/The Open University, U.K.

Study also suggests dwarf planet in asteroid belt may be a source of rich organic matter. A detailed study of blue salt crystals found in two meteorites that crashed to Earth – which included X-ray experiments found that they contain both liquid water and a mix of complex organic compounds including hydrocarbons and amino acids. A detailed study of the chemical makeup within the tiny crystals, which included results from X-ray experiments also found evidence for the pair’s past intermingling and likely parents...

This vertically exaggerated view shows scalloped depressions in a part of Mars where such textures prompted researchers to check for buried ice, using ground-penetrating radar aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona

Frozen beneath a region of cracked and pitted plains on Mars lies about as much water as what’s in Lake Superior, largest of the Great Lakes, researchers using NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have determined. Scientists examined part of Mars’ Utopia Planitia region, in the mid-northern latitudes, with the orbiter’s ground-penetrating Shallow Radar (SHARAD) instrument. Analyses of data from >600 overhead passes with the onboard radar instrument reveal a deposit more extensive in area than the state of New Mexico...