Contributors

Thursday, April 04, 2013

Life?

Ever since I can remember, I have always wondered if there was ever life on Mars. Being the closest planet to us, I guess I have just assumed that perhaps at one time it did. Now it looks as though that was the case.

CheMin and SAM identified some of the key chemical ingredients for life in this dust, including sulfur, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and carbon, researchers said. Intriguingly, the mix also suggested a possible energy source for indigenous Martian life, if any ever existed in the area. "The range of chemical ingredients we have identified in the sample is impressive, and it suggests pairings such as sulfates and sulfides that indicate a possible chemical energy source for micro-organisms," Paul Mahaffy, SAM principal investigator at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., said in a statement.

So, not just the possibility of life but also an energy source for that life. Stunning! I'm hoping that as more tests are done we will learn exactly what kind of life existed on Mars. And perhaps there will be more discoveries as Curiosity continues her mission?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

could have lived existed.

Nikto said...

Over the last 50 years spectroscopy has detected all kinds of organic molecules in interstellar space. That doesn't mean there's intelligent life out there, it just means that laws of physics in the universe make it extremely easy for the building blocks of life to be created everywhere.

That's one reason why scientists think the evolution of life is so likely: the chemistry just makes it happen, especially after 13 billion years.

I personally think life is pretty rare in universe, because the universe is such a dangerous place with all those asteroids zinging around and supernovae blowing up, and, if we're any example, intelligent life is extremely self-destructive.

But I wouldn't be surprised at all if the rock under the Martian surface is teeming with microscopic life, just as the rock under the oceans could be the biggest ecosystem on Earth.