NASA’s Curiosity rover has found new evidence that adds weight to the possibility there has been life on Mars (in the distant past).
NASA’s Curiosity rover has found new evidence preserved in rocks on Mars that suggests the planet could have supported ancient life, as well as new evidence in the Martian atmosphere that relates to the search for current life on the Red Planet. While not necessarily evidence of life itself, these findings are a good sign for future missions exploring the planet’s surface and subsurface.
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover at the site from which it reached down
to drill into a rock target called “Buckskin” on lower Mount Sharp.
The new findings – “tough” organic molecules in three-billion-year-old sedimentary rocks near the surface, as well as seasonal variations in the levels of methane in the atmosphere – appear in the June 8 edition of the journal Science.
Organic molecules contain carbon and hydrogen, and also may include oxygen, nitrogen and other elements. While commonly associated with life, organic molecules also can be created by non-biological processes and are not necessarily indicators of life.
“With these new findings, Mars is telling us to stay the course and keep searching for evidence of life,” said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters, in Washington. “I’m confident that our ongoing and planned missions will unlock even more breathtaking discoveries on the Red Planet.”
“Curiosity has not determined the source of the organic molecules,” said Jen Eigenbrode of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, who is lead author of one of the two new Science papers. “Whether it holds a record of ancient life, was food for life, or has existed in the absence of life, organic matter in Martian materials holds chemical clues to planetary conditions and processes.”
Although the surface of Mars is inhospitable today, there is clear evidence that in the distant past, the Martian climate allowed liquid water – an essential ingredient for life as we know it – to pool at the surface. Data from Curiosity reveal that billions of years ago, a water lake inside Gale Crater held all the ingredients necessary for life, including chemical building blocks and energy sources.
Mars isn’t an easy place to escape to if things turn pear shaped on Earth, but if life is proven to have survived there in the past it would add weight to the lack of uniqueness of life on Earth.
Your NZ 
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018Hats off to all those involved in the Mars Orbiters and Rovers. The views we get of this remarkable rust-dust-covered planet, and the information they keep sending back, just blow me away.
I really look forward to the first successful manned (personned?) mission to the red rock. Will be a private or government venture?
Joe Bloggs
/ 8th June 2018Well said. It’s a fantastic achievement along with the rest of space exploration… when I think back to when I was a kid and the moon landing… just blows me away what we get to see these days…
Kitty Catkin
/ 8th June 2018We had some ancient films about space rockets and exploration that were shown at Sunday School (I think) It wasn’t for some time afterwards that I realised that this was not new and wasn’t just happening at that time.
I think that Earth’s problems should be solved before space experiments are done..
Kitty Catkin
/ 8th June 2018I wonder if most peploe have a mental picture of Martians and other space aliens as ‘little green men’ ?
Corky
/ 8th June 2018Martians average 5’8 and have ebony skin and eyes. They ain’t green. The little finger is longer than the other fingers and acts like a second thumb. Females have a small protuberance on each temple.
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018You can’t draw conclusions that all martians look the same just going by the ones you’ve met. It might only be a little over half the size of Earth but it’s still a pretty big planet.
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018If they’d waited until earth’s problems had been solved before doing space experiments we’d never have even made it into space. Humans will always want to see how far they can possibly go. Horizons and the challenges of seeing what’s beyond them have always driven the curious and the restless among us.
There have been countless side-benefits for mankind from pursuing space exploration.
Kitty Catkin
/ 8th June 2018What are these ?
Apart from Mars bars and moonstones ?
Kitty Catkin
/ 8th June 2018i have a moonstone necklace and they are lovely stones, Mine are not top grade, but I don’t care about these bagatelles, they are still moonstones.
The Martian description sounded like W——- P——.
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018Every year since the mid-1970s, NASA has published a list of space technologies that have been integrated into everyday items. The tangible benefits span from life-saving medical devices to protective eyewear. To date, NASA has documented nearly 1,800 “spinoff” technologies. Here’s a short list.
Artificial limbs
Baby formula
Cell-phone cameras
Computer mouse
Cordless tools
Ear thermometer
Firefighter gear
Freeze-dried food
Golf clubs
Long-distance communication
Invisible braces
MRI and CAT scans
Memory foam
Safer highways
Solar panels
Shoe insoles
Ski boots
Adjustable smoke detector
Water filters
UV-blocking sunglasses
Also -https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benefits_of_space_exploration#Direct_benefits
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018Whoops – mucked up link somehow. Try again
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benefits_of_space_exploration
Corky
/ 8th June 2018Ufologists also release lists of things apparently leaked to businesses from crashed saucers:
1- Printed circuit boards.
2- Velcro.
3-Transistor.
4- Night Vision and associated optics.
5- Memory metal.
Scientists don’t buy it.
https://www.livescience.com/61253-alien-alloys.html
Other reports ( Majestic 12) speak of scientists going into shock and unable to accept the reality of a technology way ahead of their comprehensions.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majestic_12#Alleged_members
There’s an interesting conclusion from a sceptic.
Kitty Catkin
/ 8th June 2018Velcro was invented in 1940.
The transistor was invented in the 1920s.
And so on.
There is evidence of when & where these things were invented – and by whom they were invented. .
Corky
/ 8th June 2018That’s where you are wrong. The transistor has a few people claiming to have invented them…one is a New Zealander, the late Dr Robert G. Adams of the Adams Motor fame.
http://www.beatriceco.com/bti/porticus/bell/belllabs_transistor1.html
I could go on, but leave you with this thought. Have you noticed how our technology quantum leaped from the Nazi era on? The Vril Society claimed to be in contact with a Master Race.
i
Kitty Catkin
/ 9th June 2018Please don’t go on.
One could hardly help ‘noticing’ that technology has advanced since the end of WWII. Your reasoning is too absurd to be worth wasting time on refuting.
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018That “i” is a tad egotistical, I have to say.
Kitty Catkin
/ 9th June 2018At least it’s lower case.
NOEL
/ 8th June 2018So all those life building blocks had a conference and decided not to go ahead. Don’t blame them.
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018I suspect the main issues were over access to water.
Zedd
/ 8th June 2018If you look at some of the pictures.. it does appear that there was once liquid water on Mars, which most scientists agree is needed for ‘life as we know it Jim’ BUT something changed.
If there is methane.. perhaps there are ‘Mars cows’ burping somewhere ? 😀
Kitty Catkin
/ 8th June 2018Mar-cows rather than moo-cows ? 😀
Or astronauts eating baked beans ?
Zedd
/ 8th June 2018more likely micro-organisms in soil.. ‘burping’
Kitty Catkin
/ 8th June 2018Microburps and microfarts !
Have you seen the fake baked beans ad with the astronauts ? Very funny.
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018I’m not so sure that’s fake. You’ll notice they haven’t been back to the moon since 14 December 1972 … 😕
Griff
/ 8th June 2018Methane could power colony’s.
If we could get enough methane or CO2 into the atmosphere we could terraform mars into something almost habitable.
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018We’d have to keep pumping it out – I think the lack of a magnetic field to deflect the solar wind is the main suspect for the place’s currently thin atmosphere.?
Griff
/ 8th June 2018We would need to pump enough gas into the atmosphere to over take that what is lost due to such effects. Mars has lost its atmosphere over eons. If we could alter mars atmosphere hence climate for a even a short period in planetary time it would assist colonization efforts.
Speculation as we have no real idea about how much is there as yet.
Getting to mars?
Trust in Musk. .
http://www.spacex.com/
Gezza
/ 8th June 2018Yeah I’m getting the feeling a privately funded mission might precede a government one. Either that or it’ll be a joint Private/NASA venture. NASA uses mostly private contractors anyway, I think, for their design and build.
We don’t even know yet whether Mars is geologically stable – but we’re getting there. Can’t wait. Hope a manned landing happens before I kick off.