Ancient Mars might have been warm, wet like Earth
Turns out, ancient Mars might've been way wetter than we thought.
A new study says the Red Planet once had a thick atmosphere and enough rain to carve valleys and fill up lakes—kind of like Earth's tropical or semi-arid places.
This flips the old idea that Mars was always dry and freezing.
How the study was conducted
Researchers used satellite images, checked how craters eroded, and ran hydrological models.
They found signs that rain fed rivers and lakes, leaving behind landscape changes.
Could Mars have supported life?
If early Mars was warm and rainy, it could've been friendly to simple life forms billions of years ago.
That's a big deal for NASA's Perseverance rover, which is still hunting for fossil clues that life ever existed there.
Basically, this research gives us more hope that Mars was once a place where life could thrive.