Mars - The Evolution
Yup! You read that right. Even if we are millions of miles away from Mars our scientists were able to learn how Mars evolved after it formed 4.6 billion years ago.
How?
If you haven’t noticed, we are kind of obsessed with Mars. Since the 1800’s, humans have been fascinated by the red planet. Back then, scientists would only observe Mars using a telescope. As of today, we’ve already sent out numerous satellites and rovers to help us further understand the red planet and see if it once harbored life.
The surface of Mars have lots of craters and that’s what the scientists used to determine the evolution of Mars. They figured that the greater number of craters in a region, the older that particular surface is.
Scientists were able to divide the lifeline of Mars into 3 periods, namely:
Noachian Period - The earliest of 3 periods. Scientists believe that during this time, Mars was bombarded with meteoroids and asteroids creating craters of different sizes. It is also believed that volcanoes were very active during this time.
Hesperian Period - Named after the Hesperia Planum - A high plain in the southern hemisphere. When the meteoroids and asteroids stopped visiting Mars. A new age began called the Hesperian Period. During this time volcanic activities continued in Mars covering most of the craters that formed during the Noachian Period. It is also at this time when large outflow channels of Mars were formed.
Amazonian Period - Named after the Amazonis Planitia - A low plain in the northern hemisphere. The modern day age. During this time the polar caps formed, large volcanoes were formed and some cratering occurs from time to time and continues up to this day.
Mars is a very mysterious planet and is the closest to Earth in terms of characteristics. That makes our scientists so eager to learn more about the planet. So many questions are left unanswered. Like “Did Mars have a vast amount of water flowing on the surface before?”, “Was there life?”, “Is weather in Mars as cold before as it is now?”
Those kind of questions keep our scientists busy. Plus we are also exploring the possibility where humans can visit Mars. That is the job of the rovers that we have there now, to help our scientists figure out answers to all this questions.
The Phoenix lander is the latest rover sent to Mars, it packs sophisticated equipments that enable scientists to closely examine the soil in Mars as well the water ice. The Phoenix is currently doing a good job and we are getting closer and closer to answering all those questions.