Life Found at 2,400m Bellow Earth's surface and implications for Life on Mars

Could these exist on Mars ?


Scientists from the International Ocean Discovery Program have sunk the deepest marine drill to a record breaking depth of 2,400m beneath the seabed off Japan and discovered a thriving colony of tiny, single-celled organisms.

The discovery has positive implications for the chances of finding life on Mars and other bodies in our Solar system in my opinion.

Elizabeth Trembath-Reichert, from the California Institute of Technology, who is part of the team that carried out the research, said: "We keep looking for life, and we keep finding it, and it keeps surprising us as to what it appears to be capable of."

We now know Mars had lakes and probably oceans in its past and had an atmosphere that could sustain them for hundreds if not billions of years , if similar organisms formed there then perhaps they still exist in their own protected environment deep bellow the surface of the planet as they do here.

The team found that microbes, despite having no light, no oxygen, barely any water and very limited nutrients, thrived in the cores.

Implications for microbial life on Titan dining on it's abundant hydrocarbons ?

"The thought was that while there are some microbes that can eat compounds in coal directly, there may be smaller organic compounds – methane and other types of hydrocarbons - sourced from the coal that the microbes could eat as well."
The experiments revealed that the microbes were indeed dining on these methyl compounds.

Evidence for carbon molecules on Mars

The crystalline grains encasing the carbon compounds provided a window into how the carbon molecules were created. Their findings indicate that the carbon was created during volcanism on Mars and show that Mars has been doing organic chemistry for most of its history.

"These findings show that the storage of reduced carbon molecules on Mars occurred throughout the planet's history and might have been similar to processes that occurred on the ancient Earth," Steele said. "Understanding the genesis of these non-biological, carbon-containing macromolecules on Mars is crucial for developing future missions to detect evidence of life on our neighboring planet."
carnegiescience.edu...

The findings also have implications for the hunt for life on other planets.
If life can survive in the most extreme conditions on Earth, perhaps it has found a way to cope with harsh environments elsewhere in the cosmos.
www.bbc.co.uk...

I believe our Solar System is home to life outside of what exists here on the Earth and when we as a species finally sort our priorities out and go looking for it we will be amazed at what we find.

Very very cool. Where there is energy and material on earth there is life.

I don't think that there is any reason to think there is anything special about our planet in terms of being 'extra' hospitable to life.

We as a species are already engaged in the search.

I fully expect that we'll find it within my lifetime.

a reply to: draknoir2

Microbial at the very least. But I guess that depends on NASA/ESA/anyone'sspaceprogram being funded enough for long enough first.

Unless they show up first lol.

a reply to: gortex

All this speculation yet there is no definitive proof that there has ever existed any water on Mars.

This is all scientific theory of what might be. As it stands we have not found any life what so ever anywhere in the cosmos other than on the earth. Some scientists have said they have found evidence, but their evidence is not convincing enough because it is too open to interpretation as having been a result of other processes.

These microbes could have found their way there and adapted over a long period of time. They may well not be the oldest forms of life, just organisms that have adapted to the harsh environment.

I wonder what the definitions of life really are? Is a star not alive? It does not have a consciousness in human terms, but how do we know what its essence is. It is mighty and almost immortal compared to our brief time as organisms. Is not the whole universe alive really?

a reply to: draknoir2

We as a species are already engaged in the search.

At present we're searching for a habitat suitable for life , to my knowledge the only mission sent to Mars to search for life was Viking.

I fully expect that we'll find it within my lifetime.

I hope so but am not so confident.

originally posted by: lonesomerimbaud
a reply to: gortex

All this speculation yet there is no definitive proof that there has ever existed any water on Mars.

The Phoenix lander confirmed the existence of water on Mars.

a reply to: lonesomerimbaud

All this speculation yet there is no definitive proof that there has ever existed any water on Mars.

There is plenty of evidence , here's some.

These microbes could have found their way there and adapted over a long period of time.

Those microbes are on Earth , I am postulating that similar microbes could exist on Mars.

I wonder what the definitions of life really are

As far as I'm aware one of the definition of life is that it reproduces itself so no a Star isn't alive.

a reply to: gortex

ok, so i'm looking at your picture






and all i'm thinking is. how many of these little things did they kill off when drilling to find the few in the picture?

originally posted by: draknoir2
We as a species are already engaged in the search.

I fully expect that we'll find it within my lifetime.

I hope you are like 5yrs old.

a reply to: gortex

But stars DO reproduce themselves Gortex, just not the way humans do. Debris from old stars make new stars. It is a scientific fact.

Stars of the early era of our universe are long since dead and what they were have become new stars. It happens all the time out there.

Ok, so that is one definition of life that humans and stars share in common, just not the same method.

So what is your next definition of life premise?

Yes, they could exist on Mars, though not the same because there is no water there like there is on earth. If you put these microbes in water on Mars they will not survive, I postulate as you postulated.

I am not saying there is no life on Mars. We have not found water there and we have not found life there as it stands.

Please don't be mad at me for being scientific about this. It is the only sure premise for us making any true sense of life, the universe and everything.

originally posted by: RayVon

originally posted by: draknoir2
We as a species are already engaged in the search.

I fully expect that we'll find it within my lifetime.

I hope you are like 5yrs old.

If only.

Off by one order of magnitude.

a reply to: lonesomerimbaud

So what your next definition of life premise?

"Life is a thermodynamically open chemical system with a semi-permeable boundary. It contains an information-based complex system with emergent properties, part of which drives a metabolism based on a proton gradient. The said gradient generates the necessary potential difference across the semi-permeable boundary. The information is heritable and coded in such a way as to allow variation and thus evolution."
www.newscientist.com...

Yes, they could exist on Mars, though not the same because there is no water there like there is on earth.

Perhaps not now but there was plenty of water on Mars a couple of billion years ago.
Here's NASA's vision.

Please don't be mad at me for being scientific about this. It is the only sure premise for us making any true sense of life, the universe and everything.

Not mad I gave you a star
But you are wrong about the water.

a reply to: gortex

Actually, I should think that your deep sea creatures would be better suited for something like Venus, and not Mars. High pressure, sometimes very high temperatures in volcanic vents; seems quite a lot like Venus.

Now, the plankton recently found growing on ISS would seem quite like what might be found on Mars. Very thin atmosphere, cold temperatures, at least in the shade...rather like Mars.

Personally I believe that Venus, Earth, and Mars started pretty much the same...but due to many factors, Earth was the only planet that could sustain the right conditions...But, that doesn't mean that life was extinguished on the other two either...we have extremophiles right here on Earth that could survive, maybe thrive, on either Venus or Mars.

a reply to: tanka418

Personally I believe that Venus, Earth, and Mars started pretty much the same...but due to many factors, Earth was the only planet that could sustain the right conditions

I agree mate.
From what I've read it's believed Venus was much like Earth in it's distant past and a good place for life , if only we could build the tech to go there and explore we may well find life there too.

not to sound condescending but is "life" really that interesting if its just single celled organisms?

the fact that life exists other places, not of earth, is that really important? The universe is unfathomably massive and the chances of life are .... huge. finding life that can be as amazed it found other life and can say hello, thats important.

I don't think there's any debate that life could have existed on Mars, and might even exist today, in spite of the very harsh environment. But there's a big difference between hypothetical life and real life, and that's finding it and verifying it. So while it's interesting to find life in even more obscure nooks and crannies on Earth, it still leaves the probability of finding life on Mars exactly the same. Fifty-fifty.

It's either there, or it ain't.

originally posted by: thishereguy

and all i'm thinking is. how many of these little things did they kill off when drilling to find the few in the picture?

Exactly. This is what everyone forgets when they get all excited about space exploration:

The Prime Directive.

Yes, I know Star Trek isn't real. But. I happen to be a big believer in the principle. We shouldn't be digging around on other planets looking for life when we have no idea what effects our activities will have on said life.

It's possible that we just killed an entire evolutionary strain by haphazardly digging around like that. Just because we can go to Mars doesn't mean we should go to Mars. We have neither the necessary technological advancement nor the emotional maturity to engage in such endeavors responsibly.

Hate to break it to everyone...

originally posted by: gortex
From what I've read it's believed Venus was much like Earth in it's distant past and a good place for life , if only we could build the tech to go there and explore we may well find life there too.

It's too bad that Venus rotates so slowly. Otherwise, we could re-engineer some bacteria to eat up the CO2 and convert it into water and nitrogen and maybe bring the planet around to something not quite so harsh. Or maybe we could detonate our nuclear arsenal on the planet (get some good use out of it) and trigger a nuclear winter. After a few hundred years, it might even be habitable.

Still, it's a pretty poor substitute for Earth.

a reply to: gortex

Bless your enthusiasm. I'm sorry for being so pragmatic.

I am still not convinced by what NASA are saying as definitive proof that water existed on Mars. We are still in the days of theory about all that. If they found definitive proof then of course I would believe it then.

Only since Rosetta have scientists decided not to go with the theory that comets brought all our water here. I had always argued against that and the Rosetta mission has gone some way to proving I held a correct assumption.

The reason I did not believe that comets brought water to the earth is that the amount of ice it would take to arrive here to make the 70% ocean volume we have on earth would mean comets of huge proportion on a continual basis. Such impacts would have created utter devastation. Also, that how come they stopped happening? Why would comets crash into us that often and just stop when we had 70% water volume?

As far as the earth goes life is not static. It evolves and diversifies. Where there is life there is a huge diversity. Why on Mars would there be life that is so static and lacking in diversification? Only by diversity has life managed to continue on the earth. The dinosaurs died out because something changed. They were that fragile. However, other species were not affected so life continued. Diversity I see as a survival mechanism for life as we know it on the earth.

I still hold that this universe is the same wherever we are in it. The laws that apply to earth apply to Mars and any other planet. It is only a theory again, but that is where I am coming from.