Recent research suggests that ancient lakes on Mars might have stayed liquid under thin layers of seasonal ice, even though average temperatures were freezing. Scientists from Rice University adapted a climate model used for Earth to simulate what Martian lakes were like roughly 3.6 billion years ago. Their findings show that a thin ice crust could have acted as insulation, protecting the liquid water underneath for decades at a time during steady climate periods. This discovery helps explain geological evidence of water on the Red Planet without the need for a permanently warm climate.