SciTechDaily
By Jet Propulsion Library
June 30, 2021
A new paper finds more radar signals suggesting the presence of subsurface ‘lakes,’ but many are in areas too cold for water to remain liquid.
In 2018, scientists working with data from ESA’s (the European Space Agency’s) Mars Express orbiter announced a surprising discovery: Signals from a radar instrument reflected off the Red Planet’s south pole appeared to reveal a liquid subsurface lake. Several more such reflections have been announced since then.
In a new paper published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, two scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California describe finding dozens of similar radar reflections around the south pole after analyzing a broader set of Mars Express data, but many are in areas that should be too cold for water to remain liquid.