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Mars rover detects carbon signature that may hint at past life source
- sunjester 5y agoTLDR; "Still, the rover has seen no physical traces of ancient microbes"
- awb 5y agoOr just the subtitle: > Dramatically “light” carbon could also be explained by atmospheric reactions or cosmic dust
- AYBABTME 5y agoNot a pro but AFAIK the threshold for anyone saying "yup we found life" would be very high and probably that the instruments currently deployed on Mars wouldn't possibly suffice to convince someone at NASA to make that call. That is, because (every?) experiments out there can be explained by a multitude of phenomenons that could be non-life based. I wouldn't be surprised if life turns out to be abundant over there and we've just been very hard-nosed on the evidence we'll accept. At least that's my understanding, when looking at summaries like https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwXSEP3_Rwk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwXSEP3_Rwk.
- hulitu 5y agoThe problem is that there is so much noise regarding life on other planets (we found life on Venus, we found life on Mars ) that when we will really will be finding something will be something like "Another clickbaity title".
- RosanaAnaDana 5y agoI dont think we would expect physical traces, but rather chemical traces.
- changoplatanero 5y agoIt would be so exciting if they find life there
- skeptical1 5y ago
- curiousgeorgio 5y agoI'm glad they're careful not to oversell this finding, but it's a little discouraging how far we are from the phrase we want to hear: "Mars has life" "We've found past life on mars" "Rover finds past life on mars" "Rover finds hints of past life on mars" "Rover detects hints of past life on mars" "Rover detects carbon signature that hints of past life on mars" "Rover detects carbon signature that may hint of past life on mars"
- Stevvo 5y agoYou would have to look for evidence of life in the first place if you wanted to find it. None of the rovers we have on Mars right now have the right instruments to do so. Exomars' Rosalnd Franklin will be the first.
- floxy 5y agohttps://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/viking-1/in-depth/ https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/viking-1/in-depth/ Viking 1 July 20, 1976: Lander touched down Scientific Instruments Lander 1. Imaging System (2 facsimile cameras) 2. Gas Chromatograph Mass Spectrometer (GCMS) 3. Seismometer 4. X-Ray Fluorescence Spectrometer 5. Biological Laboratory 6. Weather Instrument Package (Temperature, Pressure, Wind Velocity) 7. Remote Sampler Arm
- klyrs 5y agoNot for me. Behind all those hedges is where the intrigue lies! I'd rather that than overselling a thrice-maybe as a positive.
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- skeptical1 5y ago
- rkagerer 5y agoAs Harrison noted, the authors are appropriately conservative. The team found that the carbon trapped in a handful of rocks probed by the rover is dramatically enriched in light isotopes of carbon. On Earth, the signal would be seen as strong evidence for ancient microbial life... ...however, the researchers are reluctant to make any grand claims, and they have worked hard to concoct alternative, nonbiological explanations involving ultraviolet (UV) light and stardust. But those alternatives are at least as far-fetched as a scenario in which subterranean microbes emitted the enriched carbon as methane gas. The team concludes the study does “inch up the plausibility” that microbes once existed on the planet...
- Stevvo 5y agoI'm curious if we do if we do find evidence for life on another planet would we explain it away with non-biological theoretical phenomenon before realizing its significance?
- ffhhj 5y agoThe DNA would be sequenced, compared to Earth's life forms, and if no relation is found then it should be explained. For me it would exponentially increase the probabilities of more life in the Universe.
- Enginerrrd 5y agoIf DNA is found, it almost certainly indicates a common ancestor. The likelihood of DNA evolving twice from whatever separate self-reproducing protolifeforms came before it has to be unbelievably low.
- colordrops 5y agoWe only have a single sample of a life encoding mechanism such as DNA. We can't know if it's one of many possibilities, or the naturally emergent phenomenon for life, like stars and quartz crystals that would form the same way anywhere from the same basic components of our physical universe.
- firekvz 5y agoEverytime news like this comes up, I'm more certain that if we ever find life outside our planet, it would take years to be announced
- vmception 5y ago6 hours tops
- geenew 5y agoI had the same thought after the phosphine gas discovery at Venus was announced. It will take so long to be certain about a claim like this, and evidence will mount so gradually, that by the time the confirmation is made it will be unsurprising. Sort of like the discovery of ancient liquid water on Mars - it took so long to prove it that by the time proof was certain, it had become a joke (NASA announces discovery of water on mars for Nth time! haha). On the down side, we're less likely get a world-wide event to collectively celebrate; on the up side, we're less likely to panic subgroups of society.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- pugworthy 5y agoMakes me think of how there is a huge hesitation to ever use the "F" word with any Mars photos. F - as in fossil. There are definitely natural mineral formations that can mimic fossils, but then there are fossils too that aren't always obviously such.
- chrononaut 5y agoLikely context of parent regarding fossils: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Hills_84001 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Hills_84001
- hulitu 5y agoAnd seconds to be destroyed.
- andy_ppp 5y agoIt will be interesting to see if all life uses DNA in four pairs or if every planet evolves a system for encoding life differently.
- beeboop 5y agoMy entirely uninformed guess is that life on Earth is probably fairly representative of how life forms on any similar planet. Throughout evolution there are endless ways life could have formed, and we're the product of whatever method worked best against billions or trillions or more possibilities. I wouldn't be surprised to find plants and animals on other planets that are not dissimilar to ones on Earth, especially considering the sheer number of types of animals and plants and how much they vary in structure and appearance.
- friendlydog 5y agoConsidering the 1996 "Life on Mars Hoax" was recently debunked, a bit of patience and caution would serve our planet.
- agucova 5y agoIs anyone else having problem accessing the paper? The link on Science isn't working, and the DOI I managed to find in the rest of the coverage doesn't seem to exist. I can't find the paper anywhere.
- JorgeGT 5y agoSame. The reference appears to be "Depleted carbon isotope compositions observed at Gale crater, Mars, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences(2022). http://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2115651119 http://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2115651119" DOI is not working yet but this is normal, however the link to PNAS seems broken indeed: https://www.pnas.org/content/119/4/e2115651119 https://www.pnas.org/content/119/4/e2115651119
- c-smile 5y agoWe are finding Mars originated rocks here, so it can be pieces of Earth on Mars too. Probability is low due to relatively thick Earth atmosphere, but still...
- ncmncm 5y agoIt astonishes me anew every time they land one of these things on Mars with exactly zero microscopes on board.
- hulitu 5y agoMicroscopes are expensive and you need to hire a martian to look at the samples. Last i looked on Linkedin there were not many martians with this qualification.
- wruza 5y agoDon't we have microscopes that generate jpegs?
- hadlock 5y agoJPEG was patent encumbered up until 2009
- ncmncm 5y agoIt is impossible to imagine JPL unable to get a license for a Mars probe. Never mind JPL using lossy compression on science data.
- zokier 5y agoCuriosity rover already used jpeg compression: https://www.design-reuse.com/news/34583/jpeg-encoder-ip-core-msss-camera-system.html https://www.design-reuse.com/news/34583/jpeg-encoder-ip-core...
- ncmncm 5y agoI heard that we had sent robots to Mars. (Some people don't believe that, but I do.) Some of these robots have been equipped to do a variety of sample preparations and science observations, and even to report some of their results back to Earth scientists.
- ArnoVW 5y ago
- PicassoCTs 5y agoI wonder - if you would build a dome over one of the water-ice-swamps in the canyons and allowed atmosphere to build up- if we would see something grow..
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- hulitu 5y ago"Damn it J355ie, i told you not to shit outside".