Mars - Water from long long ago.

[Minimalist]

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/12/a-com...existence/

Billions of years ago, a lake once filled the 96-mile- (154-km) wide crater being explored by NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity, bolstering evidence that the planet most like Earth in the solar system was suitable for microbial life, scientists said on Monday.

The new findings combine more than two years of data collected by the rover since its sky-crane landing inside Gale Crater in August 2012.

[Cato]

This is why you don't let these dorks speak to the public:

“All that driving we did … just didn’t get us to Mount Sharp. It gave us the context to appreciate Mount Sharp,” Grotzinger said of the rover, which has traveled around 5 miles (8 kms) since landing on Mars in 2012.

[Anomalocaris]

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/12/a-com...existence/

Billions of years ago, a lake once filled the 96-mile- (154-km) wide crater being explored by NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity, bolstering evidence that the planet most like Earth in the solar system was suitable for microbial life, scientists said on Monday.

The new findings combine more than two years of data collected by the rover since its sky-crane landing inside Gale Crater in August 2012.

There are several question that this finding raises which the announcement didn't address.

1. The announcement implies Mt Sharp in the middle of Gale crater is made up entirely of sedimentary deposits, implying the sedimentary deposits must have at one time been at least 5 kms thick throughout the crater, which in turn implies water must have accummulated in the crater over an aggregated length long enough to lay down 5 kms (3 times as much as the Grand Canyon sequence on earth) of sediments. But the rim of the crater is less than 5kms tall, indeed the summit of Mt Sharp is higher than any point on the rim. The implication is no standing water in the crater could possibly have overtoped the summit of Mt Sharp without overflowing the crater walls. How could Mt. Sharp be deposited?

2. Where did the sediments come from? If the sediments came from erosion of crater rim, was there ever enough material in the crater rim to lay down a 5 km thick sequence of sedimentary deposits on the crater floor? Again how could the sediments on Mt Sharp end up higher than the rim from whence they were first eroded? Erosion and transportion moves things down hill, not uphill. If the sedimentary came from a river flowing in from outside, the problem becomes even more severe. There is only one breach along the rim of Gale Crater, and a meandering channel probably cut by water does flow into the crater. But the channel is even lower than the crater rim. How could the sedimentary material the river may have transported end up on top of Mt Sharp?

[Minimalist]

The new studies, which have not yet been published, point to a series of wet and dry times at Gale Crater, challenging a previously held notion that Mars’ period of warm climate was early and relatively short-lived, scientists said.

You may have to wait a bit for that kind of detail. You aren't getting that in a press release.