‘Clearest sign’ of ancient Mars life — NASA

[pood]

NASA talks up ancient Mars life.

Nature paper

 

[pood]

Of course, now we probably won’t be able to bring back this sample because Mango Mussolini is trying to slash NASA’s budget by half, as the article explains.

 

[Shadowy Man]

NASA Says Mars Rover Discovered Potential Biosignature Last Year - Astrobiology

A sample collected by NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover from an ancient dry riverbed in Jezero Crater could preserve evidence of ancient microbial life

astrobiology.com

“This finding by Perseverance, launched under President Trump in his first term, is the closest we have ever come to discovering life on Mars. The identification of a potential biosignature on the Red Planet is a groundbreaking discovery, and one that will advance our understanding of Mars,” said acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy. “NASA’s commitment to conducting Gold Standard Science will continue as we pursue our goal of putting American boots on Mars’ rocky soil.”

Good job politicizing this, Duffy.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

NASA Says Mars Rover Discovered Potential Biosignature Last Year - Astrobiology

A sample collected by NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover from an ancient dry riverbed in Jezero Crater could preserve evidence of ancient microbial life

astrobiology.com

“This finding by Perseverance, launched under President Trump in his first term, is the closest we have ever come to discovering life on Mars. The identification of a potential biosignature on the Red Planet is a groundbreaking discovery, and one that will advance our understanding of Mars,” said acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy. “NASA’s commitment to conducting Gold Standard Science will continue as we pursue our goal of putting American boots on Mars’ rocky soil.”

Good job politicizing this, Duffy.

Dude gets bonus for using word "soil". *tiny bit of respect*

 

[robnisch]

NASA Says Mars Rover Discovered Potential Biosignature Last Year - Astrobiology

A sample collected by NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover from an ancient dry riverbed in Jezero Crater could preserve evidence of ancient microbial life

astrobiology.com

“This finding by Perseverance, launched under President Trump in his first term, is the closest we have ever come to discovering life on Mars. The identification of a potential biosignature on the Red Planet is a groundbreaking discovery, and one that will advance our understanding of Mars,” said acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy. “NASA’s commitment to conducting Gold Standard Science will continue as we pursue our goal of putting American boots on Mars’ rocky soil.”

Good job politicizing this, Duffy.

Dude gets bonus for using word "soil". *tiny bit of respect*

Reminds me of a Prof I had. "You grow potatoes in dirt; you build on soil"

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

NASA Says Mars Rover Discovered Potential Biosignature Last Year - Astrobiology

A sample collected by NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover from an ancient dry riverbed in Jezero Crater could preserve evidence of ancient microbial life

astrobiology.com

“This finding by Perseverance, launched under President Trump in his first term, is the closest we have ever come to discovering life on Mars. The identification of a potential biosignature on the Red Planet is a groundbreaking discovery, and one that will advance our understanding of Mars,” said acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy. “NASA’s commitment to conducting Gold Standard Science will continue as we pursue our goal of putting American boots on Mars’ rocky soil.”

Good job politicizing this, Duffy.

Dude gets bonus for using word "soil". *tiny bit of respect*

Reminds me of a Prof I had. "You grow potatoes in dirt; you build on soil"

Dirt is whar you vacuum up.

 

[steve_bank]

In the late 19th early 20th centuries there were many who were suree there were canals on Mars and a civilization. Rampant speculation by a number of scientists.

Mapped the canals: From his observations in the 1890s, Lowell created detailed maps of hundreds of canals, convinced they were real features.
Civilization hypothesis: He theorized that Mars was a dying planet and that the canals were built by an intelligent civilization to transport water from the polar ice caps to the equatorial regions to sustain their world.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Go get the samples??

I can't imagine The Felon doing so.

Life on Mars? Were we not a unique creation? Why did God create life where it couldn't survive?

The scientists: They want to know, but at the same time finding truly independent life on Mars would be a horrible discovery, strongly suggesting the Great Filter is in front of us.

 

[barbos]

Since you don't want these samples, can Chinese take them?

 

[steve_bank]

Anyone see the movie Andromeda Strain?

NASA makes periodic announcements like this, it is good press in pop culture.

 

[pood]

Anyone see the movie Andromeda Strain?

NASA makes periodic announcements like this, it is good press in pop culture.

I think that is kind of unfair to NASA. They first reported these findings over a year ago, and have been studying them since before making this announcement. There is also a peer-reviewed paper in Nature.

 

[pood]

NASA is very conservative about pronouncements about possible alien life. There are still scientists who think the 1976 experiments on the Martian surface found life, but NASA says inconclusive at best and probably not life.

 

[steve_bank]

NASA is very conservative about pronouncements about possible alien life. There are still scientists who think the 1976 experiments on the Martian surface found life, but NASA says inconclusive at best and probably not life.

NASA has to be and is politically aware and savvy. Especially under Trump.

It has to show results. It will rise or fall based on how it fits Trump's political image.

Science has always had to play politics for funding.

Connecting research to possible militray applications. Economic benefit.

 

[pood]

NASA is very conservative about pronouncements about possible alien life. There are still scientists who think the 1976 experiments on the Martian surface found life, but NASA says inconclusive at best and probably not life.

NASA has to be and is politically aware and savvy. Especially under Trump.

It has to show results. It will rise or fall based on how it fits Trump's political image.

Science has always had to play politics for funding.

Connecting research to possible militray applications. Economic benefit.

All true, and perhaps they made the announcement at this time to ward off his plan to cut their budget by half, which would doom returning these samples from Mars per the original plan.

 

[pood]

Here is Science Daily’s article on the Mars findings. It seems to go into a little more detail.

The combination of these minerals, which appear to have formed by electron-transfer reactions between the sediment and organic matter, is a potential fingerprint for microbial life, which would use these reactions to produce energy for growth. The minerals also can be generated abiotically, or without the presence of life. Hence, there are ways to produce them without biological reactions, including sustained high temperatures, acidic conditions, and binding by organic compounds. However, the rocks at Bright Angel do not show evidence that they experienced high temperatures or acidic conditions, and it is unknown whether the organic compounds present would've been capable of catalyzing the reaction at low temperatures.

The discovery was particularly surprising because it involves some of the youngest sedimentary rocks the mission has investigated. An earlier hypothesis assumed signs of ancient life would be confined to older rock formations. This finding suggests that Mars could have been habitable for a longer period or later in the planet's history than previously thought, and that older rocks also might hold signs of life that are simply harder to detect.

 

[pood]

A model for microorganisms now living on the surface of Mars, based on the 1976 Viking experiments.

 

[bilby]

The 1976 Viking experiments were inspired by the earlier work, Life on Mars - (D. R. Jones et al., 1973), which countered the idea that the planet may have hosted multicellular organisms with the claim "It's a God-awful small affair".

Allegedly

 

[BH]

Why can't they send a probe to Mars with a drill and a microscope and simply have a camera on the microscope send pictures of the drilled dirt back to Earth?

It is almost like they claim they want to find life but really don't. A microscope couldn't be any heavier than one of those cameras they have on all sides of the probe.

 

[Shadowy Man]

Why can't they send a probe to Mars with a drill and a microscope and simply have a camera on the microscope send pictures of the drilled dirt back to Earth?

Both the Curiosity and Perseverance rovers had such equipment. Look into the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) on the former and the WATSON camera on the latter.

It is almost like they claim they want to find life but really don't. A microscope couldn't be any heavier than one of those cameras they have on all sides of the probe.

But if you’re talking about sifting through the samples and trying to isolate potential life signatures or bacteria or whatnot on a microscope slide like a person would do in a lab, that’s like quite difficult for a rover to do.