Mars Soil Similar to Hawaiian Volcanic Soil
But surfing not as good
The first-ever in-depth analysis of Martian dirt reveals a mineralogical makeup similar to that of Hawaiian volcanic soils, researchers announced Tuesday.
The results come from NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, which recently studied a scoop of Red Planet dirt with its Chemistry and Mineralogy instrument, or CheMin, for the first time.
"This Martian soil that we've analyzed on Mars just this past week appears mineralogically similar to some weathered basaltic materials that we see on Earth," David Bish, a CheMin co-investigator with Indiana University, told reporters. He cited as an example the "weathered soils on the flanks of Mauna Kea in Hawaii."
Hide Comments (0)
Editor's Note: As of February 29, 2024, commenting privileges on reason.com posts are limited to Reason Plus subscribers. Past commenters are grandfathered in for a temporary period. Subscribe here to preserve your ability to comment. Your Reason Plus subscription also gives you an ad-free version of reason.com, along with full access to the digital edition and archives of Reason magazine. We request that comments be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment and ban commenters for any reason at any time. Comments may only be edited within 5 minutes of posting. Report abuses.
Please
to post commentsMute this user?
Ban this user?
Un-ban this user?
Nuke this user?
Un-nuke this user?
Flag this comment?
Un-flag this comment?