• silverbax@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    In my lifetime we’ve gone from ‘there’s no water on Mars’ to ‘there’s tons of water all over the equator, evaporating into the atmosphere daily then freezing on the surface at night’. Which is pretty cool.

      • Havald@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        I doubt it. There are no indigenous people there that rely on that water so nestle wouldn’t be motivated enough to get it.

    • henfredemars@infosec.pub
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      5 months ago

      Careful! I’m told those individuals are responsible for nearly all productive work on the planet.

          • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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            5 months ago

            Sadly, it takes a shit ton of energy to get things to the sun. Everything is moving very quickly around the sun. You need the opposite amount of energy to fall in.

            • KISSmyOSFeddit@lemmy.world
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              5 months ago

              You only need enough energy to get it down to the orbit of Venus, plus a little bit extra for some gravity assists around Venus and Jupiter. Those will shoot it to the edge of the solar system where a tiny bit of thrust will kill the remaining angular momentum and let it fall back into the sun.
              Oh, and it will take a century.

      • AutistoMephisto@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        We should send genetically modified cockroaches and algae. Then check back 500 years later. Surely there’s no way it can go wrong

        JOHJ in the distance

  • Shyfer@ttrpg.network
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    5 months ago

    Wow that’s incredible. We’re still making such incredible discoveries despite Mars being so close to home.

    • KingJalopy @lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      Funny how we consider that “close” in terms of space. It’s such a massive distance we can’t really comprehend it and it’s only the first planet out from us. Even at the speed of light it would take 3 minutes+ to get there! I’m no spacengineer but that’s like 186k miles per sec. Or something. Space is big. Really big.

      • El Barto@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        For comparison, you can travel around the Earth’s equator several times per second at the speed of light.

      • rozodru@lemmy.ca
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        5 months ago

        wish someone would discover Warp Drive already or…I wish someone would discover something more “interesting” like The Warp. would you rather use crystals to travel at warp speed OR, and just bare with me here, OR would you rather travel through an alternate dimension filled with demons and gods that want to enslave you where you need powerful psychics to navigate and a massive “light house” potentially powered by one God-like human in order to find your way back to Earth.

        I think the second option is way more “fun”.

      • niktemadur@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        Also, the comparatively small and weak gravitational field of Mars has made it a most challenging target in the solar system, behind only Mercury and the Sun itself.
        Of course, through trial and error, with better know-how and tech, they have gotten increasingly competent and even reliable at the task.

  • AwkwardLookMonkeyPuppet@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    the frost patches cover a vast area of each of the volcanoes, and its water content could fill roughly 60 Olympic swimming pools, measuring close to 29.4 million gallons (111 million liters) of water.

    Wow! That’s far more than I expected. I think it’s probably more than anyone expected!

    • Luvs2Spuj@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Lemmy read the article for you. Yes.

      The frost sits within the Tharsis area, the largest volcanic region on Mars, which hosts 12 large volcanoes. This includes Olympus Mons, which is not only the tallest volcano on Mars but is also the tallest peak in the solar system at the height of 18.6 miles (29.9 kilometers), making it around 2.5 times the height of Mount Everest, the tallest mountain on Earth.

      • Klear@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        Had a hunch so I googled the size of Phobos just now: 27 by 22 by 18 kilometers. Olympus Mons is larger than the bigger of Mars’ two satelites.

        Though it’s probably more that I severely underestimated just how tiny Phobos and Deimos are. They feel bigger in Doom…

      • Krauerking@lemy.lol
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        5 months ago

        So… It’s not weird if you have ever worked to try to get funding to do mars exploratory missions with the approval of the planetary councils.

        One of the big rules is we can’t go where we think there might be water and therefore life on Mars unless we can prove our device is 100% sanitized. To the point where a friend and colleague gave up and suggested we just shoot the surface with a copper ball and just collect the dust once it’s in upper atmosphere.

        Also, I was already part of a group that was taking pictures of lava tubes and we discovered cracking and shifting soil like a decade ago letting us know we had found surface water. It’s kinda old news to me.

        Edit: I guess the interesting part of this discovery is specifically that it’s frost since that is a unique form for the water to take especially there. Since we would expect it to sublimate pretty quickly.

          • Krauerking@lemy.lol
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            5 months ago

            Not anymore. I couldn’t get funding for either of my projects and literally couldn’t figure out to do with my dual majors in theoretical astrophysics and xenobiology.

            So now I work basically just IT support…

            I helped build the infrared cameras for some satellites, nothing like getting a stack of diamond disks for lenses and just tossing half of them for impurity reasons to make you understand how the budgets end up so high.

            And I was using the THEMIS camera for specifically work with mars atmospheric and habitability studies.

            Edit: I dunno here is a fun side fact. Because of my past life, I have had direct interactions with Bill Nye (the science guy), that make me know he is an asshole, and I consider him to be a negative force on the scientific community. Just all around a self absorbed anti intellectual.

        • afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          guess the interesting part of this discovery is specifically that it’s frost since that is a unique form for the water to take especially there. Since we would expect it to sublimate pretty quickly.

          If I am understanding the article. On Mars it’s backwards compared to earth. Earth it is higher you go the colder it is. So to get frost up that high means air currents containing cold water are rushing up to that spot.