Watch InSight's successful landing on Mars: Difference between revisions
Watch InSight's successful landing on Mars (edit)
Revision as of 03:11, 27 November 2018
, 5 years ago→Speculation could it detect Curiosity liquid brines
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If Elysia Planitium has salts below the surface that can take up water from the atmosphere it might have similar brines too, and if so, perhaps the mole could notice the brines as a more heat conductive layer just below the surface as it starts to drill? Especially if the conductivity varied and was highest in the early morning, it might be the Curiosity brines. Just an idea.
For more about these brines see
* [[Deliquescing_salts_taking_up_moisture_from_the_Mars_atmosphere#Temporary_liquid_brines_forming_every_night_at_depths_down_to_15_cm_below_the_surface_of_equatorial_sand_dunes | Temporary liquid brines forming every night at depths down to 15 cm below the surface of equatorial sand dunes]]
They will also use the seismometer's recording of the reverberations of the self hammering mole to gain insights into the structure of the regolith - it should be able to detect the interface between rock and regolith that they think should be present and determine the depth of the regolith. It could also detect any strong signals of water rich layers indirectly through changes in the elasticity of the rock. See [https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/52da/80d5730524b9534c00b73505be02280a1655.pdf Analysis of regolith properties using seismic signals generated by InSight’s HP3 penetrator (pdf)]
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