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NASA's search for Martian life goes underground |
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16:41, July 11, 2007 |
NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander will take the search for life on the red planet underground next year when it probes beneath the surface of the arctic northern plains, U.S. scientists revealed Monday.
Prior missions have used surface rovers to explore the planet's hills and craters, but Phoenix will dig into Martian soil with a 2.3 meter (7.5 foot) robotic arm to find conditions favorable to past or present life.
U.S. scientists want Phoenix to try and find out whether frozen water near the planet's surface might periodically melt enough to sustain a viable environment for microbes.
"Phoenix will complement our strategic exploration of Mars by being our first attempt to actually touch and analyze Martian water -- water in the form of buried ice," said Doug McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program.
Phoenix will blast off from Florida sometime in August, beginning a journey that will end several million miles and around nine months later with a risky descent and landing.
Once safely in position on the Martian surface, Phoenix will deploy a set of advanced research tools never before used on the planet.
Peter Smith, Phoenix's principal investigator at the University of Arizona, Tucson, said the craft would be able to study the history of the ice and analyze how liquid water has modified the chemistry of the soil.
"In addition, our instruments can assess whether this polar environment is a habitable zone for primitive microbes," Smith said.
Source:Xinhua/agencies
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