One of the goals of research on Mars is to find possible evidence of life. In this context, the European Space Agency (ESA) has now made people sit up and pay attention: the “Mars Express” probe discovered “signs of spiders” near the “Inca city” in the planet’s southern polar region.
The report that under certain conditions small amounts of liquid water can form beneath the surface of the Earth-like planet due to solar radiation during the day was considered a scientific sensation – and fueled speculation about whether life could actually be possible there.
Message with a wink?
At first glance, the ESA images would have the potential to fuel this even further, but the title of the find is actually seen with a wink. On its website, the organization explains what the ‘spiders’ actually are.
Instead of supposed insects, the probe may have captured small, dark structures that form when the spring sun hits layers of carbon dioxide deposited during the dark winter months.
Sunlight causes the carbon dioxide ice on the ground to turn into gas, which then builds up and breaks through the ice sheets above. In the Martian spring, the ice layers, which can be up to a meter thick, break open.
Spots up to a kilometer in diameter
The escaping gas, laden with dark dust, shoots up through cracks in the ice in the form of tall fountains or geysers before falling back down and settling on the surface. This creates dark spots between 45 meters and a kilometer in diameter. This creates the characteristic ‘spider-shaped’ patterns under the ice.
If you take a closer look at the photos, you will see that the photographed objects are actually many times larger than spiders. The dark patches stretch across a part of Mars nicknamed ‘Inca City’, stretching across towering hills and vast plateaus.
“Mars Express” on an important mission
The new images were taken with the high-resolution stereo camera of “Mars Express”. The probe has revealed a lot about Mars over the past twenty years, by mapping minerals, examining the composition and circulation of the atmosphere, probing beneath the crust and studying the Martian environment.
He provided the most comprehensive map of the chemical composition of the atmosphere, examined the inner Martian moon Phobos and traced the history of water on the planet. It has been proven that environmental conditions once existed on Mars that may have been suitable for life.
Source: Krone
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