NASA’s Perseverance rover has found that water played a major role in forming minerals across Mars’ Jezero Crater. After more than three and a half years exploring the Martian surface, the rover discovered that very different rocks share the same mineral fingerprints, pointing to a watery past that influenced much of the crater.
The findings come from a study led byElise Clavé at the Institute of Space Research in Berlin, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets. The research team reports that three main rock formations show a surprisingly similar mix of minerals. This suggests that water shaped many parts of Mars, not just isolated spots.
Different Rocks, Same Minerals
While exploring, Perseverance mapped three main rock formations. Elise Clavé and colleagues note that igneous rocks are found on the crater floor and edges, while sedimentary rocks in the western parts were likely carried and deposited by water long ago.
“Three of these units are dominated by mafic to ultramafic rocks: the igneous rocks of Séítah (olivine cumulate on the crater floor), the sedimentary rocks of the Upper Fan (Western delta) and the Margin Unit, of likely igneous origin,” the authors said.
Even with these different origins, the same water-linked minerals appear in all three formations, showing how widespread water’s effects were.
Carbonates are especially notable. The team reported in the study, published Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, that they can make up as much as 16 percent of some rocks. These likely formed from chemical reactions between rocks and carbon dioxide, helped by liquid water, possibly in the lake that once filled Jezero Crater or in hot water circulating underground.
SuperCam Analysis Reveals Details
The discoveries were made using Perseverance’s SuperCam, a sophisticated instrument that employs multiple laser techniques to analyze rocks from several meters away. Researchers note that this tool allows scientists to determine both the elemental composition and the specific minerals present in a rock without ever physically touching it.
The study also finds that minerals such as iron- and magnesium-rich carbonates,hydrated silica, and phyllosilicates are present across all three rock formations. These minerals typically form in the presence of water, indicating that liquid water likely played a role in shaping a variety of rock types across the Jezero Crater, leaving a consistent mineral fingerprint throughout the region.
Is Mars Really Heating Up?
Clavé and her team suggest that the carbonation seen in Jezero rocks could have affected Mars’s climate. By trapping carbon dioxide in rocks, these processes may have gradually cooled the planet, changing it from a wetter, potentially habitable world into the cold, dry Mars observed today.
“These in situ observations may be extrapolated to other carbonate-bearing rocks on Mars and would make the amount of carbon potentially stored in Martian ultramafic rocks overall significant,” stated the study team.
The shifts in Martian minerals caused by water weren’t just local phenomena. They are part of a vast geological narrative that helps scientists trace the Red Planet’s evolution over billions of years.
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