By Ron Cowen
The first analyses of Martian soil scooped up by the robotic arm on NASA’s Mars Phoenix Lander supports the notion that liquid water has flowed on the Red Planet.
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A cubic centimeter of Martian soil — about the size of a sugar cube — delivered to one of the miniature laboratories on the lander has revealed several water-soluble elements and inorganic compounds, including sodium, potassium chloride and magnesium, reports Samuel Kounaves of Tufts University in Medford, Mass. Kounaves leads the wet-cell lab experiment, which adds water to samples in order to detect soluble substances.
“We have found what appears to be the requirements — the nutrients — to support life [on Mars], whether in the past, present or future,” he said during a telephone press briefing on June 26. The findings, he added, are one more piece of evidence showing the presence of salts created by “some sort of liquid action at some point in the history of Mars.”