Planetary scientists were able to prove that on the equator of the Red Planet periodically appear unique streams of liquid and very salty water, which retain the dark stripes.
This helped the scientists to the spectral data from the probe MRO, RIA Novosti reported with reference to the article from the journal Nature Geoscience.
In 2011, the images captured by HiRISE camera on board MRO, were spotted dark stripes, the width of which is between 0.5 and 5 meters. These bands appear and thrive in the summer, and the Martian winter, they disappeared.
Then it was assumed that these bands can be very salty water flows, which in summer temperatures remain liquid.
In the new work, which NASA has been dubbed "the puzzle of Mars", a team of scientists has presented the first evidence in favor of such salty streams do exist.
Scientists have made findings after analyzing the data that were collected CRISM instrument during observations of craters Palikir and Hale. The first was found very thick and long dark stripes.
Researchers have studied the strip and found that within them and immediately close to them there is a large amount of so-called hydrated salts (crystals conventional mineral salts that contain a certain amount of water molecules). In the center of the bands was similar substance concentration as high as possible, and as the movement in the direction of their edges, it gradually decreased.
The most important thing is that the presence and proportion of hydrated salts is directly dependent on the time of year and how the band looked. So, at the beginning of the Martian summer, when temperatures were still low, hydrates and dark lines themselves almost was not, but by the end of the warm season, when the band began to grow, they began to appear on the surface of the ground.
Currently, scientists do not know the origin of the water, forming the dark band, and hydrated salt. Theoretically, it can be a source of ice, which is under the surface of the Red Planet, but planetary scientists themselves are skeptical that any significant reserves of frozen water may be lurking so close to the equator of Mars. According to another hypothesis - there is a common source of water at a great depth, the nature of which is maloobyasnima.