Sentences with phrase «presence of liquid water»

Other factors also suggest Mars once had a much thicker atmosphere, such as evidence of persistent presence of liquid water on the planet's surface long ago even though the atmosphere is too scant for liquid water to persist on the surface now.

Northeast Syrtis features some of the oldest exposed Martian crust with evidence for alteration in the presence of liquid water that leads researchers to believe that this site could have hosted subsurface life.

To explain the geysers, some researchers posit the presence of liquid water trapped 6 to 20 miles beneath a frozen crust.

The twin Mars Exploration rovers have encountered minerals at two widely separated locations that could have formed only in the presence of liquid water.

Phoenix found clays, salts, and calcium carbonate, substances that on Earth form exclusively in the presence of liquid water.

The Red Planet is a critical test bed for the hypothesis that life is likely to arise wherever the appropriate physical conditions — notably, the presence of liquid water — prevail on a planet for a sufficiently long time.

The lander will also mix a soil sample with water carried from Earth to test the soil's chemistry in the presence of liquid water.

With more research, astrobiologists working to identify planets in the universe with temperature levels that could allow for the presence of liquid water may be able to expand the zones they consider potentially habitable to include planets where water is found as ice.

The presence of liquid water on the surface is what makes our «blue planet» habitable, and scientists have long been trying to figure out just how much water may be cycling between Earth's surface and interior reservoirs through plate tectonics.

It has beamed back mineralogical evidence for the presence of liquid water throughout martian history and studied the density of the Martian crust in detail.

Although we are some time off from probing a distant potentially habitable world's atmosphere for the presence of liquid water or chemical traces of life, Kepler - along with supporting observations by other space - and ground - based instrumentation - is giving us a tantalizing hint of the preponderance of small rocky worlds in the Milky Way.

But conditions that allowed for the presence of liquid water on the surface of Mars must have lasted for at least 10,000 years, Barnhart said.

Most known Earth - type life depends on six essential elements (carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur, and phosphorus) and the presence of liquid water, which is often described as simply carbon - based life.

However, evidence exists from the rocks studied by NASA's rovers, including the Mars Curiosity Rover, as well as images of dry river beds made by orbiting observatories such as NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, that the Martian atmosphere 3.5 billion years ago was denser and warmer due the Greenhouse effect and supported the presence of liquid water at the surface.

Spacecraft sent to orbit Mars have identified patches of minerals that form only in the presence of liquid water.

Findings from both setups indicated the planet has the potential for conditions right for life: «Overall, our results are in agreement with previous studies in suggesting Proxima Centauri b may well have surface temperatures conducive to the presence of liquid water,» they wrote.

These layered sediments indicates the presence of liquid water in the past — and possibly traces of ancient life.

The presence of liquid water on the Red Planet is one of the factors that makes it among the most promising places in our solar system to search for signs of microscopic life, according to NASA.

Clues on the Martian surface, including features resembling dry riverbeds and minerals that only form in the presence of water, suggest Mars once had a denser atmosphere that supported the presence of liquid water on the surface.

Named Kepler - 186f, this exciting new exoplanet discovery is of a similar size and potentially of a similar rocky make - up as our very own planet, Earth and most importantly, it orbits at a distance from its host star that would allow for temperatures conducive to the presence of liquid water.

More than 20 physico - chemical processes, mostly related to the presence of liquid water, contribute to the alteration of the original chemical composition of the air inclusions in polar ice [3].

These two channels are sensitive to the presence of liquid water and precipitable water vapor.

The traditional definition of planet habitability is the presence of liquid water.