2023-10-22 18:43:14
Hydraotes Chaos, this ancient mud lake, is now one of the possible landing sites in the case of a new Martian mission. 1 billion years ago, volcanoes would have expelled tons of mud potentially containing biomolecules stored underground for several billion years.
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Volcanic processes are not reduced to effusions of lava or ash. Some volcanoes can actually spit out… mud! Although this type of volcanismvolcanism, which we refer to as “sedimentary”, is less common than classic volcanism, it is nevertheless observed in many places around the globe, and even on Mars!
Unlike their terrestrial counterparts, the mud volcanoes of the Red Planet may not have been active for a long time, but the vast dry mud lakes observed today could be of major interest in the search for biosignatures. It was by studying Hydraotes Chaos that a team of researchers came to this conclusion.
A huge network of aquifers formed 4 billion years ago
Unlike traces of mudflows, which are numerous on Mars, Hydraotes Chaos would result from an extrusion of mud directly above a very old aquifer. Thanks to the analysis of satellite images, scientists were able to identify structures interpreted as ancient mud volcanoes and reconstruct the history of this place. The results have been published in the magazine Scientific Reports.
An intrusion of igneous rocks igneous rocks could thus have led to the melting of a level of ice buried in the subsoil or caused massive dehydrationdehydration of evaporitic rocksevaporitic rocks (salts). The liquid water thus formed would have collected within an interconnected network of underground reservoirs several kilometers long and wide. This first part of history would have occurred around 4 billion years ago, at a time when the Red Planet was rich in water and when the production of biomolecules may have been possible. This giant aquifer could therefore have collected these biomolecules, keeping them sheltered for 3 billion years. Because the age of the mud lake seems rather young: only 1 billion years!
Biomolecules kept safe for several billion years
It is in fact only at this moment that the mud volcanoes would have entered into activity, expelling under the effect of gas pressure a muddy fluid potentially loaded with biomolecules not degraded by a stay on the surface. It is therefore possible that the dried mud lake of Hydraotes Chaos has preserved and concentrated these traces of primitive biological activity on Mars. This plain is therefore one of the landing sites envisaged for a future mission.
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