Weakening of ice by magnesium perchlorate hydrate

[摘要] I show that perchlorate hydrates, which have been indirectly detected at high Martian circumpolar latitudes by the Phoenix Mars Lander, have a dramatic effect upon the rheological behavior of polycrystalline water ice under conditions applicable to the north polar layered deposits (NPLD). I conducted subsolidus creep tests on mixtures of ice and magnesium perchlorate hexahydrate (MP6) of 0.02, 0.05, 0.10, and 0.47 volume fraction MP6. I found these mixtures to be increasingly weak with increasing MP6 content. For mixtures with

[发布机构] Massachusetts Institute of Technology