Chinese rover discovers hidden structures under the surface of Mars: what’s known

Thanks to his radar, the Chinese navigator Zhurong has provided new insights into what lies beneath the surface of the Red Planet. According to Chinese scientists, data from the rover show that craters are hiding deep on Mars, just below the planet’s surface. In addition, the spacecraft’s radar detected several other structures of still unknown origin, Space writes.

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The Chinese rover Zhurong reached Mars in May 2021 and was able to cover a distance of 1921 meters on the surface of the Utopia Plain in the next Earth year. The landing site of this device was not chosen by chance, because scientists believe that in the distant past Mars’ ocean of liquid water could be found here.

One of the rover’s tasks is to use its radar to study the structure of rocks at a shallow depth below the Martian surface, and also to try to detect liquid water or water ice there. As for the probe depth, the radar can send and receive signals at a depth of 4.5 m to 80 m, the rover did not detect water, but instead made another important discovery. According to Chinese scientists, radar data has shown that craters and other structures of as yet unknown origin lurk beneath the surface of Mars.

Scientists suggest that these craters may have been covered by a layer of sand for tens of thousands of years because strong winds blew on Mars. And because meteorites don’t fall on Mars as often as they do on the Moon, for example, these craters were buried under a layer of sand that wasn’t destroyed by impacts.

Scientists hope the data from the Zhurong rover will provide clues as to what the planet’s climate was like in the distant past, as well as providing a better understanding of Mars’ geological evolution.

Although Chinese scientists recently presented their work based on data collected last year, it is still unknown what happened to the rover itself. As already written Focus, the device has been unable to come out of “sleep” mode for more than two months, which it transitioned to in late spring 2022 to survive the harsh Martian winter. Although the rover was supposed to make contact with Earth at the end of December last year, China is still not commenting on what’s going on.

Against this background, the American orbiter Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter recently sent images of the Zhurong rover to Earth, and these photos show that it hasn’t moved since the device went into “sleep” mode.

Chinese scientists had previously suggested that when the rover gets a little warmer there, it will continue its work on Mars, and that the device’s solar panels will receive more light to power the batteries.

If the Zhurong rover isn’t looking for signs of ancient microbial life on Mars, its American counterpart, the Perseverance rover, continues to do so. But some scientists have already written, Focus, believe that you cannot detect such a thing. It’s just that their instruments are still too powerful for such expeditions.