Ancient Saharan rivers provide clues to a wetter Mars
By studying ancient rivers and deltas in the eastern Sahara and modern Iraq, scientists are learning about similar features on Mars. Researchers studied fluvial systems (rivers and deltas) that formed during much wetter conditions than the present and which bear striking similarities to martian systems. The terrestrial features show evidence of short-lived, very heavy rainfall events during wet periods that might have spanned tens to a few hundred years over a total duration of about 10,000 years. Between the wetter times the wind took over sculpting ridges out of old drainage channels. The researchers suggest that strikingly similar features on Mars suggest similar local and heavy runoff that lasted tens to hundreds of years over thousands of years, possibly sufficient to support habitability. A shift toward arid conditions led to the sculpting of fluvial ridges and the widespread formation of dunes across the modern martian landscape.
Source:
Fluvial Depositional Systems of the African Humid Period: An Analog for an Early, Wet Mars in the Eastern Sahara;
A. S. Zaki, J. M. Davis, K. S. Edgett, R. Giegengack, M. Roige, S. Conway, M. Schuster, S. Gupta, F. Salese, K. S. Sangwan, A. G. Fairén, C. M. Hughes, C. F. Pain, S. Castelltort [2022] JGR Planets
DOI: 10.1029/2021JE007087
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.c...
