Cosmic Chemistry: Seasonal salt-water flows could sustain human life on Mars via perchlorate decomposition

My dream job is to work for NASA as a research scientist.  In fact, I (kind of) lived this dream the summer before my senior year of college, where I was an intern at NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) in Cleveland, Ohio in the photovoltaics lab.  Of all the things I learned while I was there, one that stuck out, albeit trivial, was that they absolutely love making acronyms.  In fact, I listened to one presentation where there were more acronyms on the slides than actual words or pictures.  Point being, get ready for the most acronym-filled blog post of Tree Town Chemistry’s existence.

NASA released in a press conference on Monday, September 28th, 2015 that flowing liquid salt water has been discovered on the surface of Mars.  This discovery explains the observation of large, seasonal flows that appear as lines on the slopes of many Martian craters, called Recurring Slope Lineae (RSL), which can be up to hundreds of meters long and up to ~5 meters wide. The discovery of these RSL - and the chemistry behind them - has prompted NASA to further detail some exciting plans of sending astronauts to Mars.

ICYMS 4: Mirkin and Schatz's Gold Nanoparticle Lattices Mess with Light in New Ways

What do stained glass windows, single molecule sensing, and light-emitting diodes have in common?

Right now, not much. But research from the laboratories of Northwestern University chemists Dr. George Schatz and Dr. Chad Mirkin are trying to change that. Together, they have published several papers on a new breed of nanoparticle superlattices - materials that are turning out to do unique tricks with light. Their research contributes to the field of plasmonics, which encompasses optical phenomena that give stained glass windows their color and could find application in futuristic devices.