The European Mars Express orbiter has confirmed the existence of water ice in the south polar cap of Mars. The craft also beamed back a detailed photo of a channel on the red planet that might have long ago been created by flowing water.Scientists have long known that Mars' north polar cap is composed mostly of water ice. Previous observations by NASA's Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) had experts convinced the south polar cap contained water ice, too.In fact there appears to be a vast store of frozen water mostly buried under a blanket of carbon dioxide ice, commonly called dry ice.Some of the dry ice melts away during summer in the southern hemisphere of Mars, exposing sheets of water ice below -- that's what MGS had found photographic evidence for.In other observations made by NASA's Mars Odyssey probe over the past couple of years, scientists have found strong evidence for water ice buried in the Martian soil away from the permanently frozen polar caps. Odyssey revealed hydrogen in quantities scientists interpret to imply water ice.Now Mars Express has made the first direct detection of a chemical signature of the water ice at the south pole. Officials said today they had essentially seen the vapors of water at the surface."You look at the picture, look at the fingerprint and say this is water ice," said Allen Moorehouse of European Space Agency. "This is the first time it's been detected on the ground. This is the first direct confirmation."The images were captured by the satellite's Omega imager, a combined camera and spectrometer that divides light into its components, like a prism and analyzes the chemicals involved in producing the light.
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