One key element in searching for life on Mars is the presence of methane in the Martian atmosphere As a simple carbon compound, methane is often a precursor to the formation of the complex organic chemicals that make life possible.
FORBES: Curiosity Sniffs The Martian Atmosphere But Finds No Sign Of Life
After the Viking landers failed to find life on Mars in 1976, the scientific consensus was one of skepticism that bordered on ridicule.
And this could play a crucial role in evaluating the still-controversial evidence for the existence of life on Mars a planet that, in astronomical terms, is a mere stone's throw away.
Carl Sagan, a member of the Viking science team, said the best life detection experiment on Viking was the camera because we'd be able to see if, in fact, there were any form of life on Mars.
The Mars Express -- the first of three missions to Mars in June -- will try to find out if there is, or ever was, life on Mars.
It isn't uncommon to find environmentalists who are in awed disbelief that we can be spending billions searching for life on Mars and space explorers who feel that a focus on environmentalism narrows the reach and vision of our civilization.
CNN: How the search for aliens can help sustain life on Earth
Commenting on the latest findings, Dr Dominic Hodgson, an Antarctic lakes expert from the British Antarctic Survey (Bas) in Cambridge, said the research raised the possibility that there was life on Mars.
Yet, some of the most promising locations to search for ancient life on Mars are places where water may have been in contact with volcanic rocks, ancient hydrothermal systems where conditions may have been conducive to life.
CNN: How the search for aliens can help sustain life on Earth
In the meantime, for the sake of the citizens in the peripheral eurozone nations now facing fiscal retrenchment, pray there is life on Mars that exclusively consumes olives, red wine, and Guinness beer.
FORBES: Ugly Choices Ahead For Central Bankers: Will The Yen Drop 50%?
The techniques needed to extract fossil and climatic evidence from this lake bed, and to search for life forms that have adapted to survive in such hostile conditions, would also work on Mars so it is an ideal location to test robots and even to train would-be astronauts.
In fact, he's so set on laboring over his content-to-come, he only has one new scripted offering to share this fall: Life on Mars, a crime drama about a cop who wakes up some 30 years in the past.
When McPherson wasn't answering questions about Katie Holmes' guest turn on sophomore drama Eli Stone, he focused on the fall's two newcomers: Life on Mars, a British remake about a modern-day police detective who wakes up 35 years in the past, and Opportunity Knocks, a chance-of-a-lifetime game show from star Ashton Kutcher.
应用推荐