China announces strange discovery of Mars robot before 'death'

Before being hit by a dust storm and losing contact, China's Zhurong robot made a groundbreaking discovery about what happened on Mars 400,000 years ago.

There has long been scattered evidence that the theory that a Mars was once like Earth but became dead and quiet about 3 billion years ago seems unlikely.

Exploring the data set that Zhurong left behind before she disappeared, Chinese scientists made a surprising discovery.

The unique terrain of Utopia Planitia is of interest to both the US and China - (Photo: NASA)

According to Space , the strange signs come from crescent-shaped sand dunes located on the undulating sands of an area called Utopia Planitia .

Combining data from the Zhurong lander and the Tianwen-1 orbiter , scientist Li Chunlai from the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) discovered structures called TARs - resembling mountain ridges - forming above these giant dunes that are much darker in color than the dunes themselves.

The analysis also found that the wind-induced erosion that "shaped" the TARs also traveled in the opposite direction to what formed the lighter-colored material underneath.

Analysis suggests a massive climate change – possibly the end of an ice age – sculpted complex and strange shapes on the planet that is not actually dead – (Image: CAS).

The giant dunes were formed between 400,000 and 2.1 million years ago, making the oldest "dark TAR" only 400,000 years old.

This is clear evidence that the Martian climate with its complex weather cycles underwent major and comprehensive changes about 400,000 years ago.

The most prominent hypothesis is the appearance and disappearance of a strange ice age , different from Earth's, when the Martian poles were warmer; while dust and water vapor moved towards the mid-latitudes and settled.

Understanding the ancient climate on Mars is something that the world's scientific groups that are "taking care" of this planet always want, because it can help them recreate how Mars evolved, understand what happened there, how life was born and disappeared or where it could be hiding.

Unfortunately, Zhurong lost contact with Earth after this discovery. In images taken by NASA's orbiter, it appears to have been buried in the red planet's extreme dust storms, causing its solar panels to be covered and the robot to run out of power.

The Zhurong robot is a self-propelled lander, quite similar to NASA's Curiosity and Perseverance rovers that are also operating on Mars. However, the two NASA robots run on nuclear power, so they can survive dust storms.