Scientists capture the crackling sounds of what they believe is lightning on Mars

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Scientists have detected what they imagine to be lightning on Mars by eavesdropping on the whirling wind recorded by NASA’s Perseverance rover.

The crackling {of electrical} discharges was captured by a microphone on the rover, a French-led group reported Wednesday.

The researchers documented 55 situations of what they name “mini lightning” over two Martian years, primarily throughout mud storms and dust devils. Nearly all occurred on the windiest Martian sols, or days, throughout mud storms and mud devils.

Simply inches (centimeters) in dimension, {the electrical} arcs occurred inside 6 ft (2 meters) of the microphone perched atop the rover’s tall mast, a part of a system for analyzing Martian rocks by way of digital camera and lasers. Sparks from {the electrical} discharges — akin to static electrical energy right here on Earth — are clearly audible amid the noisy wind gusts and mud particles smacking the microphone.

Scientists have been searching for electrical exercise and lightning at Mars for half a century, stated the examine’s lead writer Baptiste Chide, of the Institute for Analysis in Astrophysics and Planetology in Toulouse.

“It opens a totally new discipline of investigation for Mars science,” Chide stated, citing the potential chemical results from electrical discharges. “It’s like discovering a lacking piece of the puzzle.”

The proof is robust and persuasive, nevertheless it’s primarily based on a single instrument that was meant to report the rover zapping rocks with lasers, not lightning blasts, stated Cardiff College’s Daniel Mitchard, who was not concerned within the examine. What’s extra, he famous in an article accompanying the examine within the journal Nature, {the electrical} discharges had been heard — not seen.

“It truly is an opportunity discovery to listen to one thing else happening close by, and all the things factors to this being Martian lightning,” Mitchard stated in an electronic mail. However till new devices are despatched to confirm the findings, “I feel there’ll nonetheless be a debate from some scientists as as to whether this actually was lightning.”

Lightning has already been confirmed on Jupiter and Saturn, and Mars has lengthy been suspected of getting it too.

To seek out it, Chide and his group analyzed 28 hours of Perseverance recordings, documenting episodes of “mini lightning” primarily based on acoustic and electrical alerts.

Electrical discharges generated by the fast-moving mud devils lasted only a few seconds, whereas these spawned by mud storms lingered so long as half-hour.

“It’s like a thunderstorm on Earth, however barely seen with a unadorned eye and with loads of faint zaps,” Chide stated in an electronic mail. He famous that the skinny, carbon dioxide-rich Martian environment absorbs a lot of the sound, making a number of the zaps barely perceptible.

Mars’ environment is extra susceptible than Earth’s to electrical discharging and sparking via contact amongst grains of mud and sand, in response to Chide.

“The present proof suggests this can be very unlikely that the primary individual to stroll on Mars may, as they plant a flag on the floor, be struck down by a bolt of lightning,” Mitchard wrote in Nature. However the “small and frequent static-like discharges may show problematic for delicate tools.”

These aren’t the primary Mars sounds transmitted by Perseverance. Earthlings have listened in to the rover’s wheels crunching over the Martian floor and the whirring blades of its no-longer-flying helicopter sidekick, Ingenuity.

Perseverance has been scouring a dry river delta at Mars since 2021, amassing samples of rock for potential indicators of historical microscopic life. NASA plans to return these core samples to Earth for laboratory evaluation, however the delivery is on indefinite hold because the house company pursues cheaper choices.

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