Nasa photo reveals mysterious hole in Mars leading to hidden cavern ‘that may contain alien life’
ALIEN life may be lurking within a mysterious caver under the surface of Mars, scientists claim.
An eerie crater on the dusty slopes of Mars' Pavonis Mons volcano was picked out by two space scientists as a prime spot for extraterrestrials.
Nasa says the "unusual" feature "appears to be an opening to an underground cavern".
An image of the hole was first snapped by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in 2011, and scientists have studied it ever since.
That first photo featured on Nasa's website over the weekend as the agency's Astronomy Picture of the Day.
"Analysis and follow-up images revealed the opening to be about 35 meters across," Nasa scientists Robert Nemiroff and Jerry Bonnell .
"The interior shadow angle indicates that the underlying cavern is roughly 20 meters deep."
The scientists went on to say that alien life may be lurking in the strange opening.
Pits like the one in Pavonis Mons will likely be the target of alien-hunting missions to the Red Planet in future.
"Why there is a circular crater surrounding this hole remains a topic of speculation, as is the full extent of the underlying cavern," Nasa said.
Mars facts
Here's what you need to know about the red planet...
- Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun
- It is named after the Roman god of war
- The landmass of Mars is very similar to Earth but due to the difference in gravity you could jump three times higher there than you can here
- Mars is mountainous and hosts the tallest mountain known in the Solar System called Olympus Mons, which is three times higher than Everest
- Mars is considered to be the second most habitable planet after Earth
- It takes the planet 687 Earth days to orbit the Sun
- So far, there has been 39 missions to Mars but only 16 of these have been successful
"Holes such as this are of particular interest because their interior caves are relatively protected from the harsh surface of Mars.
"This makes them relatively good candidates to contain Martian life."
Future missions to explore Martian pits could be conducted by spacecraft, robots, or even human explorers, they added.
Nasa recently opened applications for its next class of astronauts, some of whom it's hoped will fly to the Moon or Mars.
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In other space news, a martian moon mining mission millions of miles from Earth has been given the go-ahead.
A supersonic 990mph Nasa X-plane as quiet as the "thump of a car door" is nearly ready.
And, Nasa recently revealed a surreal photo of Earth taken from 4billion miles away.
What do you make of the alien life cave theory? Let us know in the comments...
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