Is the acknowledgement from a similar piece of work that such liquid films of water could only theoretically exist for no more than a few minutes for each martian year.


"Given the dryness of the martian atmosphere, any liquid water present at the sites we have located is likely to be in the form of thin films that result from the melting of seasonal or nighttime frost deposits. The low water content of the atmosphere implies that even if the liquid is stable, it would evaporate in the atmosphere on a relatively short time scale. However, even such transient films of water could have important geochemical implications. The few minutes each year during which a film of liquid water is present at these sites could completely dominate the chemistry of the surface because of the importance of liquid water in mediating chemical weathering."



"Any water that might form on a warm afternoon from melting water would quickly disappear in the desiccated martian atmosphere. According to the model, the highest surface pressure, 12.4 millibars, occurs at the bottom of the Hellas Basin (a low-lying area created by an ancient asteroid strike). The problem is that the boiling temperature there is only +10 °C. It can't get very hot or the water will boil away. Evaporation of water in contact with Mars' dry atmosphere is also a problem. Liquid water can be stable against freezing and stable against boiling, but unstable with respect to evaporation. The situation is analogous to Earth's oceans. Liquid water on the surface does not freeze ... or boil, yet it can evaporate if the atmosphere is not saturated with water vapor."



SOURCE: Use of spacecraft data to derive regions on Mars where liquid water would be stable
Brad Lobitz*, Byron L. Wood † , Maurice M. Averner ‡ , and Christopher P. McKay
Communicated by Baruch S. Blumberg, National Aeronautics and Space Administration Astrobiology Institute, Moffett Field, CA, December 8, 2000
(received for review January 4, 2000)