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How the World’s Saltiest Pond gets its Salt

By Guest PostFebruary 15, 2013Environmentboston university, brown university, chloride bearing salts, closed basins, dark streaks, data, david marchant, dead sea, deliquescence, don juan pond, dry valleys, flowing water, frozen desert, geologists, groundwater, high salt content, jay dickson, jim head, joseph levy, mars, mcmurdo dry valleys, moisture, oregon state, permafrost layer, present day mars, red planet, relative humidity, salinity of antarctica, salt, saltiest pond, snow, soil, temperature, time lapse photography, water tracks, world

Jay Dickson and Jim Head have gathered time-lapse photography and other data about the sustained salinity of Antarctica’s Don Juan Pond, the most saline natural body of water on earth. Their findings, published online in Scientific Reports, suggest that such ponds could be possible on Mars.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Antarctica’s Don Juan Pond might be the unlikeliest body of water on Earth. Situated in the frigid McMurdo Dry Valleys, only the pond’s high salt content — by far the highest of any body of water on the planet — keeps it from freezing into oblivion. (more…)

Meteorite Shockwaves Trigger Dust Avalanches on Mars

By Guest PostDecember 18, 2011Scienceairblast, alfred mcewen, atmosphere, basketball court, craters on mars, dark streaks, dust avalanches, dusty surface, equator, erosion, hirise camera, impact crater, jay melosh, kaylan burleigh, mars global surveyor orbiter, martian surface, meteorite, olympus mons, plate tectonic processes, red planet, shock wave, solar system, tallest mountain, university of arizona

Dust avalanches around impact craters on Mars appear to be the result of the shock wave preceding the actual impact, according to a study led by an undergraduate student at the UA.

When a meteorite careens toward the dusty surface of the Red Planet, it kicks up dust and can cause avalanching even before the rock from outer space hits the ground, a research team led by an undergraduate student at the University of Arizona has discovered.

“We expected that some of the streaks of dust that we see on slopes are caused by seismic shaking during impact,” said Kaylan Burleigh, who led the research project. “We were surprised to find that it rather looks like shockwaves in the air trigger the avalanches even before the impact.” (more…)

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How the World’s Saltiest Pond gets its Salt

Meteorite Shockwaves Trigger Dust Avalanches on Mars