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crosstherubicon t1_it0hmn3 wrote

Reply to comment by Pluto_and_Charon in Curiosity Mars Rover Reaches Long-Awaited Salty Region by Pluto_and_Charon

Brilliant, I'm rather envious. What's your PhD subject?

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Pluto_and_Charon OP t1_it110y4 wrote

I did my undergraduate degree in Geology and my PhD subject is Planetary Science. I am studying Mars, although not using rover data. My research considers Mars globally and is trying to better understand just how long Mars was habitable for and what the ancient environment was like. The time period I study (the Noachian) actually predates the crater lakes being studied by Curiosity and Perseverance by about 100-200 million years.

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apathytheynameismeh t1_it1idve wrote

This is a cool thing. I hope you get to see and do some cool stuff (outside and within the realms of what geology allows)

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Pluto_and_Charon OP t1_it2xayd wrote

Thank you I hope so to! Perseverance is currently exploring a delta, where an ancient river once emptied into an ancient lake, and looking for signs of life. It's taking rock samples that will be returned to Earth which will allow the first definitive analysis for evidence of life on Mars.

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apathytheynameismeh t1_it6drzg wrote

It’s made to think that 80oC years ago. People were saying if humans were supposed to fly god would have given us wings. Now we are driving a little robot around remotely collecting samples on another world. That got there by being launched out of our atmosphere.

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zwcbz t1_it1l549 wrote

That is really cool! I did not even know we had defined time periods in martian history. Thanks for a new rabbit hole to dive into.

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Pluto_and_Charon OP t1_it2x707 wrote

Yesss we do, there are three geological periods, how we subdivide time is something I am very interested in. However Mars chronology is in its infancy. Just like how Earth once started out with just four time periods (Cenozoic, Mesozoic, Palaeozoic and Precambrian) that were then subdivided greatly as we learnt more and more, I expect that 40 years from now the number of Mars geological periods will have doubled or more.

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Prof_X_69420 t1_it271d6 wrote

Dump question: Is there a canyon or rock face on mars where you can see the layers of sedinentary rock (where you on earth could "easily see fossils"

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Pluto_and_Charon OP t1_it2w3tr wrote

Yes! There are loads and loads of places where sedimentary layers are well exposed, probably more exposures than Earth given that most sedimentary rocks on Earth are buried by soil/vegetation/water.

Valles Marineris is the biggest example, it's a canyon 3 times deeper than the Grand Canyon and is so long it would stretch across the whole of America.

This page has dozens of pictures of cliff faces with layered rock in Valles Marineris

Here's one cool example. Maybe there are fossils there! We'd need to send a new rover or helicopter to find out :)

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