Crusted Soil on Mars (IMAGE)

Washington University in St. Louis

Crusted Soil on Mars

Caption

An image from the panoramic camera on the Spirit rover shows the terrain around Troy, where Spirit became embedded in soft soil during the spring of 2009. When the rover’s wheels cut through the darker top layer of soil, much lighter soils (white smear toward the bottom of the image) were revealed. Investigation showed that the soils had been sorted according to their solubility in water, evidence that a water cycle persists on Mars to this day.

Credit

NASA/JPL/Cornell

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