(Salt)Water on Mars

NASA has managed for the first time to prove the presence of water in a liquid state on Mars. The US Space Agency published the first images of several drops of water immortalised on the support carriage of the 'Mars Phoenix Lander'. The discovery could have important implications for the chances of finding life forms, however primitive, on the Red planet. Professor Nilton Renno from Michigan University, writes the Times, is certain that these are drops of water which it was thought could not have formed on Mars. The extremely low temperature and pressure on the planet had until now led astronomers to believe that water could only be found as ice or vapour. The temperature on the landing site of the space probe is between -140 and -20 degrees, temperatures which would allow the formation of puddles of water so salty that they would not freeze for a large part of the year. The drops formed on the ''feet'' of Mars Phoenix Lander at the moment of landing when the heat released from the landing rockets melted part of the ice trapped on the surface layer of the permafrost, the ice layer. (AGI).