What Spirit Rover Discovered About Rocks and Minerals On Mars
The rocks on the plains of Gusev are a type of basalt. They contain the minerals olivine, pyroxene, plagioclase, and magnetite, and they look like volcanic basalt as they are fine-grained with irregular holes (geologists would say they have vesicles and vugs). Much of the soil on the plains came from the breakdown of the local rocks. Fairly high levels of nickel were found in some soils; probably from meteorites. Analysis shows that the rocks have been slightly altered by tiny amounts of water. Outside coatings and cracks inside the rocks suggest water deposited minerals, maybe bromine compounds. All the rocks contain a fine coating of dust and one or more harder rinds of material. One type can be brushed off, while another needed to be ground off by the Rock Abrasion Tool (RAT).
There are a variety of rocks in the Columbia Hills (Mars), some of which have been altered by water, but not by very much water.
The dust in Gusev Crater is the same as dust all around the planet. All the dust was found to be magnetic. Moreover, Spirit found the magnetism was caused by the mineral magnetite, especially magnetite that contained the element titanium. One magnet was able to completely divert all dust hence all Martian dust is thought to be magnetic. The spectra of the dust was similar to spectra of bright, low thermal inertia regions like Tharsis and Arabia that have been detected by orbiting satellites. A thin layer of dust, maybe less than one millimeter thick covers all surfaces. Something in it contains a small amount of chemically bound water.
Read more about this topic: Scientific Information From The Mars Exploration Rover Mission
Famous quotes containing the words spirit, rover, discovered, rocks and/or mars:
“We cannot be any stronger in our foreign policy—for all the bombs and guns we may heap up in our arsenals—than we are in the spirit which rules inside the country. Foreign policy, like a river, cannot rise above its source.”
—Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965)
“Old Rover in his moss-greened house
Mumbles a bone, and barks at a mouse.”
—Walter De La Mare (1873–1956)
“She discovered with great delight that one does not love one’s children just because they are one’s children but because of the friendship formed while raising them.”
—Gabriel García Márquez (b. 1928)
“The crystal sphere of thought is as concentrical as the geological structure of the globe. As our soils and rocks lie in strata, concentric strata, so do all men’s thinkings run laterally, never vertically.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Venus me yaf my lust, my likerousnesse,
And Mars yaf me my sturdy hardinesse.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)