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NASA's Gypsum Find Clear Evidence There Was Water On Mars
First time accepted submitter RCC42 writes "The Opportunity rover has found evidence that liquid water once flowed on Mars, through the discovery of gypsum — a mineral that can only be formed in the presence of water. Though other evidence in the past has suggested highly acidic water on Mars, this is the first evidence for water with a pH suitable for life as we know it."
We can no longer ignore the need now to send people to mars to establish a base and mine. With this discovery, Mars can now supply all of our drywall needs for the next several centuries!
This space available.
Persians first calculated the volume of the earth, as a sphere. Invented spherical trigonometry, and all kinds of things.
Remember all that "Arab scientists and mathematicians" kind of talk? None of 'em were arabs. Mostly Persians, with roots in Khorasan - writing in Arabic.
It's similar to calling Sir Issac Newton a "Latin Physicist" because of the language used in the "Principia".
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
Are we talking just a thin crust, or are we talking "gypsum quarry" size formations?
The reason I ask, is gypsum contains absurd quantities of chemically bound water. If mars has a higher calcium ion concentration than earth does, and had liquid oceans at one time, it is possible that with the carbon dioxide rich atmosphere and lack of techtonic plate movement that a sizable quantity of the ocean turned into "concrete" rather than drying up.
This would mean that much of the light elements (hydrogen, etc) might have escaped being blown off the atmosphere.
This is exciting news for science fiction writers that like to dream about terraforming. Creating techtonic activity would create the geomagnetic dynamo the planet needs, and as a consequence of the subduction and volcanism, huge quantities of water vapor would be expelled as a volcanic gas.
About all the planet would need would be ammonia, for the missing nitrogen. (Doesn't titan have an ammonia atmosphere? Wink, nudge.)
This does not mean the planet would go from lifeless desert to habitable overnight, as the gasses relased would be inhospitable to oxygen dependant life like us, but certain algae species like chlorella can survive in 100% C02 atmospheric concentrations as long as there is sunlight and water. Chlorella is well researched, fully genomically sequenced, and already has engineered varieties. A strain intended to rapidly convert the atmosphere to something a bit less toxic would actually be fairly plausible.
"Mostly Persians, with roots in Khorasan - writing in Arabic."
"Needless to say, Iranian civilization ain't what it used to be."
I just have to clarify that Khorasan is modern day Afghanistan - It was part it was part of Persia, but it isn't Iran. Its a common misconception that people think Persia = Iran. In fact, Persia included (at a time) a lot, of not all of, the ---istan countries. "istan" is the the Persian suffix meaning land. Analogous to Scotland, Ireland.
My two cents of knowledge.. free for you!