Mars Express finds water in polar cap

Mars Express, the European Space Agency’s first mission to Mars, has revealed evidence of not only carbon dioxide ice but also water ice in the region of the planet's southern polar ice cap.

The orbiter, which will reach its final long-term orbital trajectory on January 28, has already been producing stunning results since its instruments first started collecting data on January 5.

The significance of the first data was emphasised by the scientists at a European press conference today at ESA’s Space Operations Centre, Darmstadt, Germany.

"I did not expect to be able to gather together - just one month after the Mars Orbit Insertion of 25 December – so many happy scientists eager to present their first results", said Professor David Southwood, ESA Director of Science.

The science team confirmed that one of the main targets of the Mars Express mission, that of discovering the presence of water, had been achieved.

"Through the initial mapping of the South polar cap on 18 January, OMEGA, the combined camera and infrared spectrometer, has already revealed the presence of water ice and carbon dioxide ice," he said.

This information was confirmed by, a new high-resolution spectrometer, and initial PFS data has shown that the carbon oxide distribution is different in the northern and southern hemispheres of Mars.

Another aim of the mission is to determine whether solar wind erosion led to the present lack of water on Mars. Here preliminary results show a difference in the characteristics between the impact of the solar wind area and the measurement made in the tail of Mars.

ESA presented pictures obtained from the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) of the 1.87 million square kilometres of Martian surface covered so far representing some 100 gigabytes of processed data. This camera, which has the capability to see objects of around 2 metres in size, has produced the longest swath, up to 4000 km, and largest area in combination with high resolution ever taken in the exploration of the Solar System. This made it possible to create a picture 24 metres long by 1.3 metres high of a portion of the planet's surface features.

German Minister for Research and Education, who is also chair of the ESA Council, said: "Europe can be proud of this mission: Mars Express is an enormous success for the European Space Programme."

Elsewhere on Mars, NASA said it had briefly regained limited contact with the Spirit rover. NASA's explorer had been largely silent since an apparent communication failure occurred as the robotic arm on the rover was being directed to take a rock sample on Wednesday. Efforts are continuing to regain full contact with the rover.

(SP)