Martian

Gr. xenon, stranger) Discovered by Ramsay and Travers in 1898 in the residue left after evaporating liquid air components. Xenon is a member of the so-called noble or "inert" gases. It is present in the atmosphere to the extent of about one part in twenty million. Xenon is present in the Martian atmosphere to the extent of 0.08 ppm. the element is found in the gases evolved from certain mineral springs, and is commercially obtained by extraction from liquid air. 

When considering how the evolution of life could have come about, the seeding of terrestrial life by extraterrestrial bacterial spores traveling through space (panspermia) deserves mention. Much is said about the possibility of some form of life on other planets, including Mars or more distant celestial bodies. Is it possible for some remnants of bacterial life, enclosed in a protective coat of rock dust, to have traveled enormous distances, staying dormant at the extremely low temperature of space and even surviving deadly radiation The spore may be neither alive nor completely dead, and even after billions of years it could have an infinitesimal chance to reach a planet where liquid water could restart its life. Is this science fiction or a real possibility We don t know. Around the turn of the twentieth century Svante Arrhenius (Nobel Prize in chemistry 1903) developed this theory in more detail. There was much recent excitement about claimed fossil bacterial remains in a Martian meteorite recovered from Antarctica (not since... 

Origin. Typical meteorites have formation ages of 4.55 Gyr and exposure ages of only 10 years, duting which time they existed as meter-sized bodies unshielded to the effects of cosmic rays. With the exception of the SNC (Martian) and lunar meteorites it is widely befleved that most conventional... 

P. J. Buttery and P. A. Siunett-Smith, Manipulation of Growth in Farm Animals, Martians Nijhoff PubHsher, Boston, Mass., 1984, pp. 211—232. 

Peroxonitrite is beHeved to be present in the crystals of nitric acid trihydrate that form in the stratosphere and in Martian soil (see Extraterrestrial materials). Peroxonitrous acid may be present in mammalian blood and other biochemical systems. However, peroxonitric acid, HNO, is not known. Before the chemistry of peroxonitrous acid was understood, these two acids were sometimes confused. 

Reductionism is the direction that unites those guys who try to dissemble the parts of a biological system, and put them under a microscope (a laser-scanning quantum-leaping one, of course) to see the sparks of imagination hidden in the least of the components. The under-the-bonnet view, to stay with the Martian s analogy. 

How can scientists collect experimental evidence about possible life on another planet Sending astronauts to see for themselves is impractical at our current level of technology. Nevertheless, it is possible to search for life on other worlds without sending humans into space. In the late 1970s, NASA s Viking spacecraft lander collected a sample of dirt from Mars, the planet in our solar system most like Earth. The sample showed no signs of life. Nevertheless, speculation continues about Martian life. 

Solid-state detectors based on silicon- or germanium-diodes possess better resolution than gas counters, particularly when cooled with liquid nitrogen, but they allow only very low count rates. PIN diodes have also recently become available and have been developed for the instruments used in the examination of Martian soils (Sects. 3.3 and 8.3). A very recent development is the so-called silicon-drift detector (SDD), which has very high energy resolution (up to ca. 130 eV) and large sensitive detection area (up to ca. 1 cm ). The SNR is improved by an order of magnitude compared to Si-PIN detectors. Silicon drift detectors may also be used in X-ray florescence spectroscopy, even in direct combination with Mossbauer spectroscopy (see Sects. 3.3 and 8.3). 

MIMOS II has three temperature sensors one on the electronics board and two on the SH. One temperature sensor in the SH is mounted near the internal reference absorber, and the measured temperature is associated with the reference absorber and the internal volume of the SH. The other sensor is mounted outside the SH at the contact ring assembly. It gives the approximate analysis temperature for the sample on the Martian surface. This temperature is used to route the Mossbauer data to the different temperature intervals (maximum of 13, with the temperature width software selectable) assigned in memory areas. Shown in Fig. 3.21 are the data of the three temperature sensors taken on Mars (rover Opportunity at Meridiani Planum) in January 2004 between 12 10 PM on Sol 10 (10 Martian days after landing) and 11 30 AM on Sol 11. The temperature of the electronics board inside the rover is much higher than the temperatures inside the SH and the contact plate sensor, which are nearly identical and at ambient Martian temperature. 

Fig. 3.21 Example of temperature variation as measured by MIMOS II temperature sensors on MER (i) inside the rover body at MIMOS electronics board (black curve), (ii) outside the rover, at the MIMOS II SH (green and red curves), which is at ambient Martian temperature (a) inside the sensor-head, at the reference absorber position (green), (b) outside the SH at the sample s contact plate (red). Temperatures at the two SH positions are nearly identical (difference less than 2 K). During data transmission between the rover and the Earth (or the relay satellite in Mars orbit) the instrument is switched off resulting in immediate small but noticeable temperature changes (see figure above)...

Fig. 3.23 Left-. Calculated relationship between the thickness of an alteration rind and/or dust coating on a rock and the amount of 15.0-keV radiation absorbed in the rind/coating for densities of 0.4, 2.4, and 4.0 g cm [57]. The bulk chemical composition of basaltic rock was used in the calculations, and the 15.0 keV energy is approximately the energy of the 14.4 keV y-ray used in the Mossbauer experiment. The stippled area between densities of 2.4 and 4.0 g cm is the region for dry bulk densities of terrestrial andesitic and basaltic rocks [58]. The stippled area between densities of 0.1 and 0.4 g cm approximates the range of densities possible for Martian dust. The density of 0.1 g cm is the density of basaltic dust deposited by air fall in laboratory experiments [59]. Right Measured spectra obtained on layered laboratory samples and the corresponding simulated spectra, from top to bottom 14.4 keV measured (m) 14.4 keV simulated (s) 6.4 keV measured (m) and 6.4 keV simulated (s). All measurements were performed at room temperature. Zero velocity is referenced with respect to metallic iron foil. Simulation was performed using a Monte Carlo-based program (see [56])...

The MER mission was originally planned to last for three months on the Martian surface. At the time of writing (July 2010), both rovers and their instruments have spent more than 6 years exploring their landing sites and are still operational. 

The instrument MIMOS 11 is extremely miniaturized compared to standard laboratory Mossbauer spectrometers and is optimized for low power consumption and high detection efficiency (see Sect. 3.3) and [326, 327, 336-339]. All components were selected to withstand high acceleration forces and shocks, temperature variations over the Martian diurnal cycle, and cosmic ray irradiation. Mossbauer measurements can be done during day and night covering the whole diurnal temperature... 

MIMOS II has three temperature sensors, one on the electronics board and two on the sensor head. One temperature sensor in the sensor head is mounted near the internal reference absorber, and the measured temperature is associated with the reference absorber and the internal volume of the sensor head. The other sensor is mounted outside the sensor head at the contact ring assembly. It gives the analysis temperature for the sample on the Martian surface. This temperature is used to route... 

First Mtissbauer Spectrum Recorded on Martian Surface Gusev Crater, January 17,2004 (3h25min)... 

Fig. 8.34 Lefty, outcrop rocks found at the crater wall of Eagle Crater, where the rover Opportunity landed on 24 January 2004. Clearly, the sedimentary structure is seen. Right) in the spectrum, taken on sol 33 (sol = Martian day) of the mission, the mineral Jarosite, an Fe -sulfate, could be identified at the Meridiani Planum landing site. It forms only under aqueous conditions at low pH (< 3 ) and is therefore clear mineralogical evidence for aqueous processes on Mars...

Fig. 8.37 Left, spectrum of an accumulation of hematite rich spherules (Blueberries) on top of basaltic soil (Sol 223-228 of the mission 1 Sol = 1 Martian day). The spectrum is dominated by the hematite signal. Estimations based on area ratios (bluebeiries/soil) and APXS data indicate that the blueberries as composed mainly of hematite. Right MI picture (3x3 cm ) of hematitic spherules (blueberries) on basaltic soil at Meridiani Planum...

Bell, J. (ed.) The Martian Surface. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (2008)... 

Free water, the essential precondition for life as we know it, has recently been detected on Mars images taken by the high resolution stereo camera (HRSC) on board ESA s Mars Express spacecraft show a patch of water ice on the floor of an unnamed crater near the Martian north pole. Geomorphic studies indicate that the surface of Mars can be divided into two types (Jaumann et al 2002) ... 

However, the origin of the water on Mars is still unknown. Since the Earth and Mars have some common features in their history, the water on Mars could have come both from its interior and from comets and asteroids. The huge size of the Martian shield volcanoes, one class of which resembles the shield volcanoes Kilauea and Mauna Kea on Hawaii, suggests that a large proportion of the water was of volcanic origin. 

August 12, 2005, saw the launch of the US spacecraft Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which entered orbit around Mars on March 10, 2006. This craft has high-resolution cameras on board to permit a more exact mapping of the Martian surface (as a precondition for the search for suitable landing grounds). 

The extensive layered sediments at the south pole, which contain water ice, will provide information on climatic variations. The subsurface sounding radar instrument SHARAD (Shallow Radar) on board the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter carried out a detailed cartographic study of the subsurface at the Martian south pole. The data indicate that the sediments there have been subjected to considerable erosion (R. Seu et al 2007). The density of the material deposited at the Martian south pole was calculated by M. T. Zuber and co-workers by combining data from the gravitational field with those from various instruments on board the Mars Orbiter, they obtained a value of 1,200 kg/m3. This value corresponds to that calculated for water ice containing about 15% dust (Zuber et al 2007). 

The layers of sediment at the Martian south pole do not consist of pure ice they are interspersed by layers of dust. The latest data were obtained by the Mars Advanced Radar for Subsurface and Ionospheric Sounding apparatus (MARSIS) on board the Mars Express Orbiter. The radar waves from the instrument pass through the ice layers until they reach the base layer, which can be at a depth of up to 3.7 km. The distribution of the ice at the south pole is asymmetric, and its total volume has been estimated to be 1.6 x 106km3 this corresponds to an amount of water which would cover the whole planet with a layer 11 metres deep (Plaut et al., 2007). 

---