5/17/2025–|Last update: 19:17 (Mecca time)
A recent study prepared by a team of geologists at the University of Colorado revealed a new perception of the old Mars completely different from what has been in mind for decades.
Instead of being frozen planets as we know it today, the results indicate that Mars was, in an offensive era, more moderate and abundant in water, where the rain or snow was constantly ranging from the sky, and rivers flow through the valleys to nurture hundreds of lakes.
The results of this study were recently published in the journal “Journal of Gioviezical Reservation: Plantes”, and researcher Amanda Stelke, who received a PhD in Geology in 2024 from the American University of Colorado.
Stickel reported that geomorphological evidence on the surface of Mars shows a remarkable similarity with the terrain of areas on the planet, such as the US state of Utah. This proposition reinforces the idea that the old climate of Mars was not only ice, but may have witnessed warm wet periods that played a pivotal role in forming its surface.
And geomorphology is a science that is concerned with studying the shapes of the surface of the earth, such as mountains, valleys and rivers, and analyzing how they are formed and changed through time as a result of natural factors such as wind, water and earthquakes.
Digital simulation of lost water history
In its investigations, the research team relied on a digital simulation model for the development of terrain, previously developed by scientists to study the surface of the earth.
The researchers used this model to simulate terrain close to the Martian equator, where two different scenarios were tested: the first is supposed to melt the ice caps, and the second assumes rain or snow. For thousands to hundreds of thousands of years in simulation, how the water affected the formation of valleys and tables.
The results appeared clearly as follows. In the case of melting ice, the heads of the valleys appeared in narrow ranges of altitudes, compatible with the edges of the ice blocks.
As for the scenario of precipitation, the heads of the valleys appeared in a wide range of altitudes, which ranged without the average level of the Martian surface to up to altitudes exceeding 3.5 kilometers, and this diversity indicates that the valleys network cannot be fully explained by the melting of the ice, but rather it is likely to be the result of regular and sporadic dandruff.
Modern satellite images of Mars show clear water fingerprints, branching channels at the equator flowing from the heights towards lakes, and perhaps towards an old circumference.
The huge sediments found in the “Gizero” nozzle, where the “Persevens” probe is now the flow of strong and deep rivers in that region during the “Naqhi era”, more than 3.7 billion years ago.
“To depose these rock blocks, you need ongoing water in depth meters.” Commented the study researcher, the head of the study and a laboratory of physics laboratory at a university. He added that Mars, since the endowment of water erosion, seemed to freeze in time, to retain an amazing way on the ground in its early ages, before its features changed due to the complex geological and biological factors.
Is Mars today a mirror of the Earth’s past?
The study indicates that Mars, despite its strangeness, may form a window overlooking a naked past to the Earth itself. While the thin atmosphere of the Red Planet led to the freezing of its features, its terrain reserves geomorphological characteristics similar to what was on our planet 3.5 billion years ago.
This hypothesis gives scientists a rare opportunity to understand early stages of the formation of hydrological and chemical systems that have preceded life on Earth.
The digital models developed by the team are a decisive tool to understand that mysterious era, as it provides direct comparisons with the real data collected by NASA’s missions, such as “Mars Odisi” and “March Global Service”.
Although the results of the study are compatible with the patterns of valleys observed on the surface of Mars, one remains one of the basic questions without a clear answer: How kept the planet enough heat that allows rain or snow melting, although the sun in that era was 25% weaker than it is today? The mechanisms that allowed the heating of the atmosphere still in widespread controversy among scientists, but this study sets the basis for more exploration in this context.