THE results are in from the first direct survey of the distribution of hydrogen on Mars, which is almost certainly tied up in water molecules. And they show that the planet is, as one geologist put it, “sopping wet”, with an average topsoil water content of 6.5 per cent, even in the dry equatorial regions.
Preliminary results from the Mars Odyssey spacecraft’s neutron-scattering detector had already revealed a high concentration of water at the planet’s poles, as expected. But now that a fully calibrated global map has been completed, it is clear that there is also a great deal of…
