Curiosity’s exploration of the Gediz Vallis channel on Mars presents new insights into the planet’s previous, revealing a possible historical past of water flows and climatic adjustments that problem earlier beliefs about Mars’ aridity. Credit score: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSSThe rover has arrived at an space that will present proof liquid water flowed on this a part of Mars for for much longer than beforehand thought.NASA’s Curiosity rover has begun exploring a brand new area of Mars, one that would reveal extra about when liquid water disappeared as soon as and for all from the Purple Planet’s floor. Billions of years in the past, Mars was a lot wetter and doubtless hotter than it’s immediately. Curiosity is getting a brand new look into that extra Earth-like previous because it drives alongside and ultimately crosses the Gediz Vallis channel, a winding, snake-like characteristic that – from area, not less than – seems to have been carved by an historic river.That risk has scientists intrigued. The rover staff is trying to find proof that will affirm how the channel was carved into the underlying bedrock. The formation’s sides are steep sufficient that the staff doesn’t assume the channel was made by wind. Nevertheless, particles flows (speedy, moist landslides) or a river carrying rocks and sediment may have had sufficient power to chisel into the bedrock. After the channel fashioned, it was stuffed with boulders and different particles. Scientists are additionally wanting to be taught whether or not this materials was transported by particles flows or dry avalanches.After arriving at Gediz Vallis channel, NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover captured this 360-degree panorama utilizing one in every of its black-and-white navigation cameras on February 3. The formation has scientists intrigued due to what it’d inform them in regards to the historical past of water on the Purple Planet. Credit score: NASA/JPL-CaltechSince 2014, Curiosity has been ascending the foothills of Mount Sharp, which stands 3 miles (5 kilometers) above the ground of Gale Crater. The layers on this decrease a part of the mountain fashioned over hundreds of thousands of years amid a altering Martian local weather, offering scientists with a strategy to examine how the presence of each water and the chemical components required for all times modified over time.For instance, a decrease a part of these foothills included a layer wealthy in clay minerals the place a whole lot of water as soon as interacted with rock. Now the rover is exploring a layer enriched with sulfates – salty minerals that always type as water evaporates.Pan round inside this 360-degree video to see Gediz Vallis channel from the perspective of NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover. Credit score: NASA/JPL-CaltechRevising Mount Sharp’s TimelineIt will take months to completely discover the channel, and what scientists be taught may revise the timeline for the mountain’s formation.As soon as the sedimentary layers of decrease Mount Sharp had been deposited by wind and water, erosion whittled them down to show the layers seen immediately. Solely after these prolonged processes – in addition to intensely dry durations throughout which the floor of Mount Sharp was a sandy desert – may the Gediz Vallis channel have been carved.Scientists assume the boulders and different particles that subsequently crammed the channel got here from excessive up on the mountain, the place Curiosity won’t ever go, giving the staff a glimpse of what varieties of fabric could also be up there.The steep path NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover took to achieve Gediz Vallis channel is indicated in yellow on this visualization made with orbital knowledge. At decrease proper is the purpose the place the rover veered off to get an up-close have a look at a ridge fashioned way back by particles flows from larger up on Mount Sharp. Credit score: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UC Berkeley“If the channel or the particles pile have been fashioned by liquid water, that’s actually fascinating. It will imply that pretty late within the story of Mount Sharp – after an extended dry interval – water got here again, and in a giant method,” mentioned Curiosity’s venture scientist, Ashwin Vasavada of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California.That rationalization could be per one of the crucial stunning discoveries Curiosity has made whereas driving up Mount Sharp: Water appears to have come and gone in phases, fairly than steadily disappearing because the planet grew drier. These cycles might be seen in proof of mud cracks; shallow, salty lakes; and, instantly under the channel, cataclysmic particles flows that piled as much as create the sprawling Gediz Vallis ridge.Final yr, Curiosity made a difficult ascent to check the ridge, which drapes throughout the slopes of Mount Sharp and appears to develop out of the tip of the channel, suggesting each are a part of one geologic system.Viewing the Channel Up CloseCuriosity documented the channel with a 360-degree black-and-white panorama from the rover’s left navigation digital camera. Taken on Feb. 3 (the 4,086th Martian day, or sol, of the mission), the picture reveals the darkish sand that fills one facet of the channel and a particles pile rising simply behind the sand. In the other way is the steep slope that Curiosity climbed to achieve this space.The rover takes these sorts of panoramas with its navigation cameras on the finish of every drive. Now the science staff is counting on the navcams much more whereas engineers attempt to resolve a problem that’s limiting the usage of one imager belonging to the colour Mast Digital camera, or Mastcam.