Posted on by Evan Gough

One Step Closer to Solving the Mystery of Mars’ Lost Water

NASA scientists have determined that a primitive ocean on Mars held more water than Earth's Arctic Ocean and that the Red Planet has lost 87 percent of that water to space. Credit: NASA/GSFC

Few scientists doubt that Mars was once warm and wet. The evidence for a warm, watery past keeps accumulating, and even healthy skepticism can’t dismiss it. All this evidence begs the next question: what happened to it?

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Posted on by Evan Gough

TRAPPIST-1 Outer Planets Likely Have Water

Three of the TRAPPIST-1 planets – TRAPPIST-1e, f and g – dwell in their star’s so-called “habitable zone. CreditL NASA/JPL

The TRAPPIST-1 solar system generated a swell of interest when it was observed several years ago. In 2016, astronomers using the Transiting Planets and Planetesimals Small Telescope (TRAPPIST) at La Silla Observatory in Chile detected two rocky planets orbiting the red dwarf star, which took the name TRAPPIST-1. Then, in 2017, a deeper analysis found another five rocky planets.

It was a remarkable discovery, especially because up to four of them could be the right distance from the star to have liquid water.

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