China’s Zhurong rover says there was snow on Mars just 400,000 years ago

The discovery completely changes our knowledge of the Red Planet, and forces us to modify the history of our neighbor.

New data sent by the chinese zhurong rover show that mars had snow just ago 400,000 years. There were already humans like Neanderthals walking the Earth, at that time.

We have known for a long time that Mars had water, but the estimates go back a long time. 3 billion years. The Zhurong rover itself brought this figure closer to 700 million years a few months ago. Now he assures that there was still snow on mars almost “just yesterday”: just 400,000 years.

the rover Zhurong of China has spent two years exploring Utopia Planitiaa huge Martian plain that is more than 3,500 kilometers in diameter.

During this exploration, he has found a number of cracks in the duneswhich could have been created by the water of nine melted:

According to his measurements, these cracks are between 1.4 and 0.4 million years old. That is, they show that there was water on mars just ago 400,000 years. And based on what we already knew, that water could have existed millions of years earlier.

You have a complete explanation of the reasoning that has led to this conclusion, on the Science website.

A drastic change in the history of Mars

This discovery increases the chances to find evidence of martian lifebecause it means that there was water on Mars for possibly billions of years.

Logically, Conditions on Mars are not the same as on Earth. Its atmosphere does not protect from radiation, nor from sudden temperature changes. There it goes from 5 or 6 degrees during the day to 130 degrees below zero at night.

But in sheltered places, perhaps in underground lakesin caves a few meters underground, the microscopic life could have been possible. That is what the NASA missions, and the Chinese space agency, are trying to find.

new evidence of Zhurong rover They assure that there was snow in Mars does alone 400,000 years. It is an impressive discovery, considering that the closest figure that was given as valid until now, was 700 million years ago.