WATER ON MARS?, BUT CAN WE DRINK IT

This planet looks lifeless lifeless

brick red and very very dry like a

desert but only until you reach one of

the poles of the red planet that's where

you come across a seemingly endless ice

cap

so if you've been imagining Mars as an

extremely dry place you might need to

change your opinion scientists think

there could have been a lot of water on

Mars in the past what makes them think

so they found loads of ancient river

valley networks and Lake beds on the

surface of the red planet Plus on Mars

there are minerals and rocks that could

have only formed in liquid water Mars

might even have experienced terrible

floods 3.5 billion years ago

these days there's still some water on

the red planet it's true that Mars

atmosphere is too thin for this water to

stay in its liquid form on the surface

of the planet but under the surface it's

a different matter

you can find water under the surface of

the planet in its polar regions the only

place where this water is visible is at

the north polar ice cap also sometimes

salty water flows down crater walls and

hillsides and there are tiny quantities

of water in the planet's atmosphere but

it only exists as vapor

anyway now that we know for sure there

is liquid water on Mars could we

probably use this water during a human

operated mission to the red planet this

way the spaceship coming from Earth

wouldn't have to bring its own water it

would make its cargo way way lighter

which in turn would decrease the cost of

the mission the spaceship would just

need to take enough water to get to the

red planet and bring along the equipment

astronauts will need to filter Martian

water to make it drinkable

but it's not all sunshine and rainbows

the main problem is that the water found

on Mars is salty it might even be as

salty as the oceans on our own Planet

but these salts aren't what you can find

on Earth if a person consumed a certain

amount of them they would be highly

toxic to the human body

on our planet these salts are formed as

byproducts of Rocket Fuel as well as in

road flares and fireworks naturally they

only occur in very dry areas if there

are no particular bacteria to break them

down these substances accumulate year

after year and their concentration in

water is constantly increasing

but in theory it's possible to purify

even such water the process of

filtration could help the astronauts get

rid of 90 percent of harmful substances

then they could use a UV disinfection

unit this would also help to get rid of

any foreign microbes if there are any

that might be hiding in the water

this stage would not only protect the

astronauts but also prevent them from

bringing any dormant Martian microbes

back to Earth

in other words future travelers to Mars

shouldn't have too many problems with

drinking water on the red planet but

only if they bring the right

purification equipment that can deal

with any water quality because however

bad running out of water in the middle

of a desert is experiencing it on

another planet sounds much more

terrifying

now I've got another question if there

is water on Mars might there be other

worlds in our solar system where we can

find water sure let's visit some of them

we'll start with Europa one of the

largest moons of Jupiter astronomers

consider Europa one of the most

promising places in the solar system to

search for new life forms all because

this Moon has a huge saltwater ocean

with a depth of 40 to 100 miles

yes it is hidden under a layer of ice

that is estimated to be from 10 to 20

miles thick but it is still potentially

habitable astronomers claim that plumes

of water erupt from cracks in the ice

shell and release the contents of the

moon's ocean into space

there's also some evidence that the

ocean might have warm water radiating

from the moon's equator which also means

there could be not just life but complex

life on Europa well I guess we'll find

all about it in 2030 when NASA's Europa

Clipper will reach the satellite and

conduct its own investigation

and we're moving on to Enceladus

Saturn's moon people have known about

this tiny sleepy world since 1789. the

diameter of the Moon is a mere 310 miles

but despite its small size it's one of

the most intriguing places in our solar

system because it too is likely to host

a warm and salty liquid ocean

watery eruptions happen on Enceladus

rather regularly the Moon spews from its

ice geysers more than one thousand tons

of water every hour this water is mixed

with organic molecules salt and other

substances

astronomers think that the ocean might

be warm thanks to the tidal influence of

Saturn the planet's tug may cause

hydrothermal activity warming the oceans

there are also places in the solar

system that might have water on their

surface but its presence hasn't been

confirmed yet for example Ganymede

another moon of Jupiter

it's the largest moon in the solar

system it's even bigger than Mercury

astronomers have long believed there is

an ocean beneath the 100 mile thick ice

crust covering the Moon

and in 2015 ganymede's Aurora activity

also hinted that this ocean could be

warm and salty unlike on Europa ice

geyser activity on Ganymede hasn't been

spotted yet the reason might be a much

greater distance between Jupiter and

Ganymede than that between the gas giant

and Europa

also there are the maybes those are

worlds where there seems to be water but

we don't know to what extent it is

liquid

one of such places is Callisto which

have you guessed it is another of

Jupiter's moons

it's pretty far from its parent planet

and also doesn't get as much radiation

as other moons plus it has a magnetic

field which definitely adds some

protection

astronomers claim there is water in this

far away world but the moon's lack of

geological activity might mean that it

can't have an ocean without some kind of

space antifreeze in other words all that

water on Jupiter satellite can be a huge

and I mean huge chunk of ice

now let's visit another space body but

this time it's not a moon but a dwarf

planet look this is series even though

people have known about it since 1801

its small size made it difficult to

study until not so long ago this space

body was considered to be a rocky world

but after the dawn spacecraft arrived at

Series in 2015 and examined the dwarf

planet a new Theory appeared

series might be less of a Rocky ball and

more of a watery Planet covered with an

icy mantle and a slushy ocean moving

beneath

if it's true Ceres could become the

nearest to Earth world with an ocean

Titan is Saturn's largest moon it has

some of the most abundant pools of

liquid in the solar system its surface

is a slurry of water ice and ice made of

lots of different compounds for example

hydrocarbons the satellite also has

dense clouds that regularly burst with

rain

and if you visited this place you'd see

rivers lakes and an ocean made up of

methane and ethane hiding under the icy

crust

now let's talk about Poor Pluto which

has changed its status a couple of times

when NASA's New Horizons flew by the

dwarf planet in 2015 it discovered a

hint of something totally unexpected an

ocean

Pluto is an icy world but there are two

things that make scientists think that

Pluto might have once hosted an ocean

first a theory that Pluto and its five

moons could have been formed out of the

same materials after a powerful

Collision

and second the tidal forces between

Pluto and its largest moon chera even

better this leaves open the possibility

that the ocean is still around

we just need more time to examine the

dwarf planet.