{"id":80022,"date":"2022-08-25T15:47:43","date_gmt":"2022-08-25T19:47:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/?p=80022"},"modified":"2022-08-25T15:47:43","modified_gmt":"2022-08-25T19:47:43","slug":"rocks-on-mars-providing-insight-into-planets-history-says-brock-scientist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/2022\/08\/rocks-on-mars-providing-insight-into-planets-history-says-brock-scientist\/","title":{"rendered":"Rocks on Mars providing insight into planet\u2019s history, says Brock scientist"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mariek Schmidt is among a team of scientists from around the world examining rocks on Mars in hopes of learning more about the Red Planet\u2019s history.<\/p>\n

A Participating Scientist in NASA\u2019s Mars Perseverance rover mission<\/a>, the Brock University Earth Sciences Professor played a key role in a research study released Thursday, Aug. 25 that outlined one of the first investigations of its kind conducted after the rover landed at Jezero Crater in February 2021. Also assisting on the study, which was led by Yang Liu at NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Lab, was Brock post-doctoral fellow Tanya Kizovski.<\/p>\n

As part of the Mars mission, Schmidt worked with fellow scientists to help guide use of the rover\u2019s instruments for research and data collection. Her focus was on the Planetary Instrument for X-Ray Lithochemistry (PIXL), an X-ray fluorescence spectrometer used to determine the fine-scale elemental composition of Martian surface materials.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the big unknowns when we landed in Jezero Crater was the origin of a particular rock unit,\u201d says Schmidt, describing a huge mass of rock detectable from orbit that covers about 70,000 square kilometres on the planet\u2019s surface. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t until PIXL was able to analyze it that we were able to determine its origin.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A

Brock University Professor of Earth Sciences Mariek Schmidt.<\/p><\/div>\n

The rock contains a significant amount of olivine \u2014 a mineral rich in iron and magnesium \u2014 as well as carbonate, a carbon-bearing compound that \u201cmay have some biosignature potential,\u201d Schmidt says.<\/p>\n

Using the PIXL, researchers determined the olivine was likely formed deep underground from slowly cooling magma \u2014 or molten rock \u2014 before being exposed over time by erosion. They were also able to see how the various minerals within the igneous rock related to one another.<\/p>\n

The olivine minerals, for example, were well-formed crystals that hadn\u2019t been eroded by wind or water, Schmidt says. Because olivine is dense, the crystals settled downward, collecting at the floor of a magma chamber or lava flow. A second mineral arrived at a later time that was also high temperature and filled the spaces around the olivine.<\/p>\n

Schmidt called the discovery \u201ceye-opening.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a view we\u2019ve never had before on Mars to be able to do those kinds of tests,\u201d she says. \u201cWe were able to show that, at least in this particular place, the widespread unit is an igneous rock.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rock type, she adds, is similar to that of a Martian meteorite found on Earth called a chassignite.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re able to take a lot of pictures from orbit of Mars but ground truthing (validating data on the ground) is really critical for being able to understand the planet\u2019s geology, and this demonstrates that,\u201d Schmidt says. \u201cWe\u2019re not finding a rock where life once existed, but we think this is an important rock unit for understanding the history of Mars.\u201d<\/p>\n

Samples from the rock unit examined in the study were collected on Mars, with the goal of seeing them return to Earth by an estimated 2034.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s amazing to be a part of this discovery \u2014 to see rocks and interpret rocks that have never been seen previously,\u201d Schmidt says. \u201cFundamentally as a scientist, it\u2019s gratifying to be able to see a rock that no one else has seen before and to say, \u2018I know exactly what that is.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

The research team\u2019s study, \u201cAn olivine cumulate outcrop on the floor of Jezero crater, Mars,<\/a>\u201d was one of a series of research papers<\/a> released Thursday in relation to the Perseverance mission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mariek Schmidt is among a team of scientists from around the world examining rocks on Mars in hopes of learning more about the Red Planet\u2019s history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":80027,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7484,7,3319,4052,41,1,5],"tags":[150,348,852,449,447,9976],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80022"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/38"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=80022"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80022\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80028,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80022\/revisions\/80028"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/80027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}