5 ms·
Scientists find desert moss 'that can survive on Mars'
- lkdfjlkdfjlg 2y agoSend it to Mars, get the process going.
- andrewclunn 2y agoThe goals of colonization and exploration of the red planet are not always aligned. I for one am not concerned regarding contamination, but I understand why others might have different priorities.
- griffzhowl 2y ago"Survive" means, after growing in normal Earth conditions, seven days' exposure to Mars-like conditions didn't kill the plants, and they were able to regenerate after being returned to Earth-like conditions. So it doesn't show the plants could actually grow on Mars.
- lawlessone 2y agoIf they kept exposing them I wonder could they use artificial selection to make something that could grow in those conditions?
- spiritbear14 2y agoProbably not, there is not much on Mars, specifically water and nitrogen availability and other minerals, organic materials like amino acids in the soil, and lack of a root microbiome. A plant would have to completely change how it operates, which is unlikely under selection processes.
- TheLoafOfBread 2y agoMaybe sending something anaerobic, like cyanobacteria?
- throwaway4aday 2y agoLife is pretty good at adapting. If we did a lot of selective breeding and genetic manipulation ahead of time and then made a sustained effort to repeatedly seed the more temperate locations on Mars we might eventually see something survive. I do think it's a bit early for that stage of terraforming. We really should experiment with smashing asteroids into Mars to see if we can kick up enough CO2 to make a difference first. I also like the idea of repeatedly impacting a single crater in order to excavate a very deep and wide hole to trap atmospheric gasses and create enough pressure near the bottom for a more human friendly environment. It'd have the added benefit of depositing a bunch of metals and other elements in a convenient location where they could be mined and smelted.
- ics 2y agoI look forward to seeing The Moss in theaters several years from now. Opening scene is a beautiful valley which turns out to be Mars followed by two hours of seeing how it has spread, done some irreparable damage to the planet which requires intervention to save surrounding planets, all while the mutant gene continues wreaking havoc on unsuspecting scientists trying to study the issue. Killer weed from outer space. Spreads on metals which alters their material properties. Filters certain gases or creates localized atmospheric conditions which prevent the team of scientists, and maybe frontier communities, from escaping the planet while their other resources get taken over by the moss... there's a lot of shlock possible here.
- iwontberude 2y agoWhy not just remake andromeda strain
- dylan604 2y agothey did in 2008. how many times does it need to be remade?
- iwontberude 2y agoOof, whoops.
- stonemetal12 2y agoSo you are saying if we used this stuff as an air recycler in a Mars colony, and there was a catastrophic failure we could repair the recycler without losing the greenery?
- safety1st 2y agoHeadline's a little clickbaity as the moss wouldn't be able to reproduce. There was a better article on this topic a week ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40781266 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40781266 The biggest obstacle is probably how scarce water is on Mars. Like this desert moss might survive for a while but without water it won't be able to reproduce and spread. The team in the link above is considering genetically engineering an organism to absorb water from the atmosphere but even then it is just trace amounts. Life requires water to survive and grow, doesn't seem like you can have a living organism terraform Mars for you unless you've introduced a ton of water through other means.
- vegetablepotpie 2y agoLet’s adjust the orbits of comets to collide with Mars and focus large solar mirrors at Lagrange points to reflect light to heat the planet.
- bell-cot 2y agoENOBUDGET Unable to allocate sufficient funding
- throwaway4aday 2y agoRequest issued for additional platinum-iridium rich asteroids to be delivered to Earth orbit.
- erikaww 2y agoENETUNREACH: The Chinorussese Solar Federation is blockading platinum rich asteroids until they get back war criminal and musician Vladimir the handyman, accused of using a wrench to knock a satellite of out orbit back onto Earth
- sandworm101 2y agoAntarctica has yielded plenty of Mars rocks, bits of Mars that were blasted off one planet by a collision to eventually land on earth. I think that dropping millions/billions more comets onto Mars might come back to haunt us.
- KineticLensman 2y agoWell, they didn't try growing it in Martian-like soil or with Martian levels of surface radiation. So the quotes in the headline are doing a lot of work here.
- mrtksn 2y agoHow hard is it to genetically engineer or develop some plant that can thrive on Martian conditions? Even if this particular desert moss wouldn't be a perfect match for Mars, maybe its a good starting point? Is something that lives at +30C to -80C on Martian chemistry impossible?
- simiones 2y agoIt's almost certainly impossible. The amount of radiation, the toxic chemistry of martian soil, the lack of any form of liquid water, the long stretches of time with far below 0 temperatures [Edit], the near 0 atmosphere - all combined make it impossible for anything resembling Earth life to survive on Mars for anything close to a year, nevermind actually thriving. Edit: you could first try to make a plant that thrives at the top of mount Everest and in Antarctica, and then add a significant amount of radiation, make it much colder, grow it in permanganate, and you might have something approaching survivability for Mars.
- whythre 2y agoYour second paragraph really drives home how hostile Martian conditions are. People seem not to realize how inimical to Terran life the Red Planet is. It’s not as simple as Matt Damon growing some potatoes fertilized with his poo.
- Retric 2y agoAntarctica has a little flowering plant life. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deschampsia_antarctica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deschampsia_antarctica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colobanthus_quitensis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colobanthus_quitensis The peak of Everest doesn’t because there’s no exposed soil not because of low pressure.
- simiones 2y agoThere is no soil on Mars either. There are rocks, dust, and sometimes ice. And my point is that Mars is many times worse than a combination of Antarctica and Mt Everest.
- lagniappe 2y agoGrow it underwater ;)
- motohagiography 2y agoif we put a nuclear reactor on the moon or mars to just burn rock, would that release C02 in to the atmosphere to where we could oxygenate it over a few decades? e.g. if there a nuclear reaction that could release oxygen and other elements from rock, we could possibly terraform a planet pretty fast.
- alkyon 2y agoDuplicate of my earlier submission: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40838917 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40838917
- snapplebobapple 2y agoThis obsession with mars seems like such a mistake. Bezos camt make a rocket for shit but he seems rigjt about oneill cylimders being the correct solution. Create limitless surface area and avoid ha ing to go up and down a gravity well is a massive win. I cant see how we are better off spending trillions on mars vs trillions on oneill cylinders.