North-Polar Martian Cap as Habitat for Elementary Life M.K.Wallis, J.T. Wickramasinghe and N.C. Wickramasinghe Cardiff Centre for Astrobiology, Cardiff University, Wales UK (wallismk@cf.ac.uk) North-polar cap over millenia Atmospheric water in Mars tends currently as for the past millenia to distil onto the polar caps and be buried under dust deposits. Diffusive release from ground-ice (and its excavation in meteorite impacts [1]) replenishes atmospheric water, allowing the gradual build up of polar ice-dust deposits. When sunlit, this warmed and sublimating ice-dust mix has interest as a potential habitat for micro-organisms. Modelling shows precipitable vapour at 10-50µm/yr, varying sensitively with small changes in orbitable obliquity around the present 25° [2]. The modelling applies to a globe with regionally uniform albedo, unlike the steep topography and dark layering of the north polar cap whose upper 300m have accumulated over the last 500 kyr [3]. The cliffs and ravines of the north-polar cap are thought to form through south-facing slopes sublimating and gaining a dirt-encrusted surface, while horizontal surfaces brighten through frost deposits. The two-phase surface derives from the dust and frost feedback on surface albedo [4] and the resulting terrain develops over diurnal cycles of frosting and sublimation, and over annual seasonal cycles. The steep south-facing sides of observed ravines when unshadowed would see for a few hours the full intensity of sunlight at near normal incidence, without the atmospheric dimming at similar inclinations on Earth. As exposed ice sublimates at T > 200K (partial pressure exceeds typical martian 0.1 Pa), a crust of dirt develops to maintain quasi-stability. The dirt crust’s main function is to buffer the ice against diurnal temperature fluctuations, but it also slows down vapour diffusion – analogous to south polar ice sublimation [5] and the growth of ground-ice [6]. We envisage 1-10 mm/yr as the net sublimation rate, compatible with the 100 kyr life and scales of the north polar ravines. Modelling of icy-dirt crusts in the polar cap Plane-parallel layers have been used to model the changing temperature through the dirt-encrusted ice cliff [7]. Thermal conduction through the dirt crust limits sublimation of underlying ice. This allows use of the thermal wave solution: where the thermal diffusivity α combining conductivity and specific heat is taken constant and τ 0 = 1.88 yr is the martian year. As in [6] we adopt a sinusoidal temperature variation and take α = 0.0001 m²/hour. Like the martian ground ice case, the transition from dirt to ice is quite sharp. The surface temperature variation at the polar cap determined from local radiative balance is largely determined by albedo, while sublimation losses from a south-facing cliff are concentrated in the summer months. For fresh frost, the albedo is close to unity but values 0.6-0.8 allow for varying amounts of exposed dirt or dust, as explored in Figure 1. This shows the integrated ice loss over one martian year (687 Earth days) using the thermal wave solution and the Clausius-Clapeyron equation for ice sublimation: for T in degrees Kelvin. The solutions in Fig. 1 indicate a 10-15cm dirt crust develops quite quickly, within a few decades, becoming thick enough to choke back the sublimation rate to under 1mm/yr, compatible with the age of the cliffs. Less steep slopes develop rather thinner crusts. The seasonal thermal wave of Equ.1 applies for depths exceeding ~5cm (two diurnal skin depths). For A of 0.6, Fig. 1 shows a 10 cm thick crust builds up in ~30yr; this thick a crust may plausibly be maintained against weathering processes. If A<0.5, the mean temperature is too high for thermal inertia alone to choke the sublimation; the crust thickens to >10 cm within a few years and the self-sealing (deposition) and flow-retarding (adsorption/desorption) properties become significant in the thicker and hotter crust [5]. For A>0.7, a 5 cm crust cuts the sublimation rate to <0.1 mm/yr - we expect frost deposition to dominate, keeping the surface icy with high albedo for most of the diurnal cycle. The thermal lag due to latent heat needs including for realistic EPSC Abstracts, Vol. 3, EPSC2008-A-xxxx (Abstract number will be completed later on), 2008 European Planetary Science Congress, © Author(s) 2008 (1) cm/s (2)