On Mars discovered signs of acid mist

Although Mars is not the weather, similar to that observed in the world, but, as it turned out, on each of these two planets is marked kinda weather phenomenon: acid mist.

Planetology Shoshanna Cole presented a compelling story of how the acid vapors "ate" stones, located within the Red Planet's surface area of ​​100 acres, located on the mountain ridge Husband Hill Columbia Hills in Gusev Crater. The researchers used a wide range of data obtained using multiple instruments mounted on NASA's Spirit rover, to get the maximum information from the study of rock outcrops.

In this work, the report focuses on rock outcrops Watchtower Class, located on the ridge top of Cumberland Ridge and Husband Hill, says Cole, an assistant professor at Ithaca College, USA, is currently collecting material for his thesis, which is planning to defend at Cornell University.

Cole turned her attention to the fact that in these areas of the Martian surface there is an unusual variation of a number of properties of rocks, demanding an explanation. So, along the ridge of a Mossbauer spectrometer Cumberland Ridge rover Spirit has revealed a large gradient of the oxidation of iron (Fe + 3) to the total iron. In addition, data from the spectrometer, and this tool Miniature Thermal Emission Spectrometer (Mini-TES), demonstrated that the minerals in these stones partially amorphized.

To explain these observations, scientists have proposed a version that Martian rocks partially lost their crystalline structure by the action of acid vapors during volcanic eruptions. The action of acid vapors results in selective solubilization or leaching of certain components of the array rock and then, when a remainder resulting from such carcass leaching removes residual water gel forms. Subsequently, a gel is exposed to sunlight, it remaining oxidizing iron to the trivalent state, and the amount of incident sunlight is proportional to the rate of the oxidation reaction, so more illuminated areas have a larger surface ratio Fe + 3 / Fe commonly indicates researcher.