What happened to the water on Mars?-- Here's a theory:?

Question

I just read a Yahoo! article that said that scientists have discovered huge ice deposits on the south pole of Mars. In the article it says, "But while images taken by NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft made public in December suggested the presence of a small amount of liquid water on the surface, researchers are baffled about the fate of most of the water. The polar deposits contain most of the known water on Mars."

Isn't it generally understood that the water on Mars has/had evaporated into space? Wouldn't that be a logical explanation? I don't understand why this theory is so difficult for the astronomical community to accept. So, please tell me what I don't know-- in other words, why are researchers "baffled about the fate of most of the water"?

Answer 1

Because of the colour of the surface, it would make more sense to suppose that the water molecules were disassociated into hydrogen and oxygen by the Sun rays (no ozone to protect from high energy rays) and that the oxygen, well... oxidized most of the stuff on the surface. The hydrogen, being a much lighter molecule, could easily have been accelerated to escape velocity by the heat from the Sun.

It is much harder to accelerate water molecules to escape speed (not impossible, just takes a lot more energy). It would have taken lots of time. If it takes X years for a certain quantity of water to "evaporate" into space and if we know that there was lots of water at some time much less than X ago, then we know that it could not all have evaporated.

Therefore, we must find how else it could have disappeared.

Answer 2

Keep in mind that "baffled" is a word that reporters like to use to emphasize a feeling. So the interview could have gone any number of ways but the reporter throws in a hard word like "baffled!" to make it that much more "interesting."

I doubt the scientist said "baffled" it was probably more along the lines of "we're not sure the process through which a planet that shows obvious signs of a past presence of water could now be so barren but..." and the reported simply summed in up in one word.

It is my understanding too that most of Mars' water was lost to space over time, but everytime I read something about the red planet I seem to find some statement that seems to conflict with the last one I read.

Answer 3

why would water evaporate into space, the planet is freezing. it may look red hot and arid, but its not. Its red, rocky and cold. Very very cold. So how does water evaporate in cold climate. However, there were once oceans on the planet, so it at one time was warmer, but it did not evaporate instead it got colder and the oceans froze up locking the water into the polar grounds. Same technique happens on earth. For instance Bering Land Bridge.

Answer 4

There are a few things we do know .
There appears to of had lots of rivers ruining and washing out large canal like rivers. Of coarse they has a sand storm that would put Texas to shame and what if the movement of the air caused the erosion???

Answer 5

Maybe the water was brought over by the aliens and then they made us, like the movie red planet.

Answer 6

I think those guys have sub consciously convinced themselves that there is some ray of life in Mars. Once that thought has been drilled in their minds, worse still in their sub-conscious they'll even surprise you by ignoring certain facts that they very well know.