LOS ALAMOS, N.M. (KRQE) – Scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory say they’ve discovered Earth-like environments on ancient Mars. NASA’s Curiosity rover recently found higher than usual amounts of Manganese on Mars craters showing sediments where water used to be and a nearby shoreline of an ancient lake.
The rover has been exploring the planet’s surface since 2012. NASA says the goal of the mission is to figure out what the surface of the planet is made of and if it could support life.
Patrick Gasda, a Los Alamos National Laboratory space scientist and lead author of the story, says they didn’t expect to find Manganese oxide in such high concentrations. He also said that on Earth, due to oxygen in the atmosphere and that the process is up by microbes. They say if life was present on ancient Mars, the increased amount of Manganese in rocks would have been an energy source for life.
Gasda published his findings in the Journal of Geophysical Research detailing what his team observed while working on the Curiosity rover.
