Mars turned red due to grinding rocks, not water

Mars turned red due to grinding rocks, not water
Recent laboratory studies have shown that Mars is not red due to the rocks being rusted by the water that once flooded the planet, but due to the ongoing grinding of surface rocks, which forms the red dust.
These findings, which open up the debate about the history of water on Mars and whether it has ever been habitable, have been presented at the European Planetary Science Congress by Dr Jonathan Merrison.
"Mars should really look blackish, between its white polar caps, because most of the rocks at mid-latitudes are basalt. For decades, we assumed that the reddish regions on Mars are related to the water-rich early history of the planet and that, at least in some areas, water-bearing heavily oxidized iron minerals are present," said Dr Merrison, of the Aarhus Mars Simulation Laboratory, Denmark.