Present-day thermal and water activity environment of the Mars Sample Return collection
Number of Authors: 272024 (English)In: Scientific Reports, E-ISSN 2045-2322, Vol. 14, no 1, article id 7175
Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]
The Mars Sample Return mission intends to retrieve a sealed collection of rocks, regolith, and atmosphere sampled from Jezero Crater, Mars, by the NASA Perseverance rover mission. For all life-related research, it is necessary to evaluate water availability in the samples and on Mars. Within the first Martian year, Perseverance has acquired an estimated total mass of 355 g of rocks and regolith, and 38 μmoles of Martian atmospheric gas. Using in-situ observations acquired by the Perseverance rover, we show that the present-day environmental conditions at Jezero allow for the hydration of sulfates, chlorides, and perchlorates and the occasional formation of frost as well as a diurnal atmospheric-surface water exchange of 0.5–10 g water per m2 (assuming a well-mixed atmosphere). At night, when the temperature drops below 190 K, the surface water activity can exceed 0.5, the lowest limit for cell reproduction. During the day, when the temperature is above the cell replication limit of 245 K, water activity is less than 0.02. The environmental conditions at the surface of Jezero Crater, where these samples were acquired, are incompatible with the cell replication limits currently known on Earth.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Nature Research , 2024. Vol. 14, no 1, article id 7175
Keywords [en]
Environment, Habitability, Jezero, Mars sample return, Temperature, Water activity, chloride, perchlorate, sulfate, surface water, water, article, astronomy, atmosphere, cell division, hydration, night, nonhuman, regolith, rock, water availability
National Category
Mechanical Engineering
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:ri:diva-72569DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-57458-4Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-85188579223OAI: oai:DiVA.org:ri-72569DiVA, id: diva2:1850903
Note
M.-P.Z. was supported by Grant PID2019-104205GB-C21 funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by Grant PID2022-140180OB-C21 funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033/FEDER, UE., UE. G. M wants to acknowledge JPL funding from USRA Contract Number 1638782. C.D.K.H was supported by Canadian Space Agency Mars 2020 Participating Scientist Grant CSA CGCPU 20EXPMARS. S.S. acknowledges funding from the Swedish National Space Agency (Contracts 2021-00092 and 137/19). V.D. thanks the FRS-FNRS for support. Part of this research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (80NM0018D0004). K.C.B. was funded by NASA Mars 2020 Grant 80NSSC20K0235. J.M.F. was supported by the Spanish Agency for Research, Contract PID2022-142750OB-I00. E.M.H. acknowledges funding from NASA RSS PS 80NSSC20K0239. A.D.C. was funded by NASA Mars 2020 Returned Sample Science Participating Scientist Program Grant 80NSSC20K0237. V.D. thanks the FRS-FNRS and PDR 35284099 for support
2024-04-112024-04-112025-09-23Bibliographically approved