NASA: Evidence of Life on Mars

Evidence of Life on Mars

www.thesun.co.uk

NASA scientists last night unveiled compelling evidence of life on Mars.
A special mission to the Red Planet has revealed the likely presence of a form of pond scum - the building blocks of life as we know it.

NASA unveiled the results of the recent Opportunity and Spirit probes sent millions of miles through the solar system to discover signs of extraterrestrial life.

The results are so promising boffins have already planned a host of other missions to discover whether there is extraterrestrial life in the universe.

The recent missions have gathered evidence of sulphates on Mars, a

(visit the link for the full news article)



[edit on 28-4-2010 by Novastar824]

"Previous missions to Mars have concluded there is probably water on the planet.

But the NASA boffins said the recent missions have gone further than any others in proving there is life on Mars.

They were particularly excited about the discovery of a sulphate called gypsum which, it has emerged recently, is found in large quantities among fossils in the Mediterranean.

Jack Farmer, researcher at the Arizona State University, in Tempe, Arizona, said he was "optimistic" there was - or had been - life on Mars."





www.thesun.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

www.thesun.co.uk
www.thesun.co.uk
www.thesun.co.uk
that pretty much sums it up.

reply to post by Ong Bak


Sure does... LOL it's like getting your information from the National Enquirer

I wouldn't trust NASA, they know more then we, of coruse they wont admit this to the general public.

The Sun may be a low credibility source, but a very brief search on Google turned up this Abstract discussing sulphates at the conference website; so that much is probably true.

www.lpi.usra.edu...

As others have pointed out already this is probably an attempt to deal with cutbacks at NASA by forefronting the search for extra-terrestrial life (such as bacteria etc.) in an attempt to gather support for more funding. having said that that doesnt mean that that it isn t possible.

The real question in my mind is whether sulphates can be made without bacteria.

reply to post by Ong Bak

www.thesun.co.uk
www.thesun.co.uk
www.thesun.co.uk

that pretty much sums it up.

Yup Almost as much as

Arizona State University
Arizona State University
Arizona State University



Perhaps they got their wires crossed and used the data from the State Capital Building down the road instead of from Mars.

Originally posted by liquidself

The real question in my mind is whether sulphates can be made without bacteria.

but you dont question the sun as a news source?

Originally posted by Novastar824

Evidence of Life on Mars

www.thesun.co.uk

A special mission to the Red Planet has revealed the likely presence of a form of pond scum ...
[/exnews

HOLY COW!!!! Politicians on Mars!!!!!????

AWESOME

reply to post by Ong Bak


I do question them as a news source. see my link in earlier post. the abstract discusses sulphates and how they are produced in combination with bacteria. The abstract is taken directly from the (real) conference on astrobiology. A disreputable source just means you have to do more work to check the facts. it by no means totally defines the information given.

Wake me if The Sun reports that they have officially found Bat-Boy on Mars.

That bogus story would at least be worth a laugh.

reply to post by Mr Mask


I am wondering what proof you have to back up the assertion that this story is false. If any.

Well, evidence is certainly good. But proof is a whole lot better.

Okay, NASA. You've shown that the venerable, old "building blocks" for life are there, or could be. Now just explain to me how those blocks are put together to form little Martian bugs, and we'll be golden. Or maybe an example of how that happened on Mars.

What's that? You can't? Then it's all just a lot of jive?

Call me when you've really got something.

Here's an MSNBC article which corroborates the article in The Sun. The relevant section is about halfway down:

Schopf and another researcher, Jack Farmer of Arizona State University, announced the results of a recent study in which they found that a type of mineral deposit called sulfate can harbor fossils of ancient organisms.

Although the scientists studied samples of sulfate from Earth, this material is also present in large quantities on Mars. The fact that they found fossilized life in Earth's sulfate means that Mars' sulfate would be capable of storing a record of life, too, if that life existed. Thus, collecting samples of sulfate on Mars would be a good place to look for Martian life, they said.

Also, I noted that The Sun article has a side-bar written by Dr. Brian Cox commenting on the discovery. Cox is a well known physicist (and former minor rock star musician) who is working on the LHC, is a Royal Society Fellow and who does a lot of popular science documentaries for the BBC and for American cable channels like Discovery. I don't think he'd put is reputation on the line in a paper like that unless they were actually doing decent science reporting in these stories. It seems like he's doing his best to bring "science to the masses," much like with his TV specials, by contributing to a tabloid paper.

never mind

[edit on 29-4-2010 by RestingInPieces]

cool NASA scientists are allways scabing aroung mars life exist on it and still does ok . i recken we need to be looking and exploring beyond..