Judge Smails
08-23-2007, 08:01 AM
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/40/104041115_b16ae1b961.jpg?v=0
If true, this could be BIG! (Well, mildly interesting, at the very least.)
Martian soil may contain life (http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,22299217-5005961,00.html)
THE soil on Mars may contain microbial life, according to a new interpretation of data first collected more than 30 years ago.
The search for life on Mars appeared to hit a dead end in 1976 when Viking landers touched down on the red planet and failed to detect biological activity.
But Joop Houtkooper of t University of Giessen, Germany, said the spacecraft may in fact have found signs of a weird life form based on hydrogen peroxide on the subfreezing, arid Martian surface.
His analysis of one of the experiments carried out by the Viking spacecraft suggests that 0.1 per cent of the Martian soil could be of biological origin.
That is roughly comparable to biomass levels found in some Antarctic permafrost, home to a range of hardy bacteria and lichen.
If true, this could be BIG! (Well, mildly interesting, at the very least.)
Martian soil may contain life (http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,22299217-5005961,00.html)
THE soil on Mars may contain microbial life, according to a new interpretation of data first collected more than 30 years ago.
The search for life on Mars appeared to hit a dead end in 1976 when Viking landers touched down on the red planet and failed to detect biological activity.
But Joop Houtkooper of t University of Giessen, Germany, said the spacecraft may in fact have found signs of a weird life form based on hydrogen peroxide on the subfreezing, arid Martian surface.
His analysis of one of the experiments carried out by the Viking spacecraft suggests that 0.1 per cent of the Martian soil could be of biological origin.
That is roughly comparable to biomass levels found in some Antarctic permafrost, home to a range of hardy bacteria and lichen.