NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander may have found water ice on the red planet, but it still has a lot of work left to do to answer the question that has been on scientists' minds for decades: Has Mars ever been capable of harboring life?
Phoenix scientists announced yesterday that the mission finally confirmed the presence of subsurface water ice in the north polar regions of Mars — first detected by NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter in 2002 — about two months after touching down on the Martian surface on May 25.
The lander is now analyzing the ice to see if it was ever a liquid and if it contains organic materials, the building blocks of life.