Alien Life on Mars
When searching for alien life, Mars often comes up. Whether life existed on the red planet in the past or is there anyone on the planet today, is still very much unanswered. The aim of the 1976 Viking missions was to determine the answers to these questions, but the results of these experiments were baffling and uncertain.
John Houtkooper, University of Giessen, Germany, explained that after looking at the data again there were two reasons why the Viking experiments provide conclusive answers to the life on Mars questions: no organic material was found in the gas chromatograph-mass-spectrometer, used to detect chemicals in a sample; and no chemicals were found that we associate with life.
Houtkooper said “Upon moisturizing the soil, they found a rapid development of oxygen, carbon dioxide, and some nitrogen.” Scientists think that an inorganic oxidant created this reaction so the Martian soil contains no life. But Houtkooper didn’t agree with this interpretation, believing instead that the Viking may have actually discovered Martian microbes.
“In my opinion, the search for an inorganic oxidant to explain the Viking results has not really come up with the definitive solution,” he says. “I think it is time to look at alternatives. The biological explanation is an interesting one.” In explaining the Viking results, Houtkooper’s theory is that Martian life may not be based only on water, but on a mixture of H2O2 (Hydrogen peroxide - a kind of bleach) and water.
A creature could “drink” by absorbing small amounts of water from the air although too much water would be a disaster. Houtkooper explains, “If these organisms consist of 50% hydrogen peroxide, then they are sensitive to water because they blow themselves up when they get too much. This could be what happened in the Viking experiment.”
Around the edge of the Mars polar ice caps has been suggested as to the best place to search for these organisms, as they need cold areas with plenty of water in the atmosphere. NASA’s Phoenix mission is scheduled to land in such a region in May of 2008 says Chris McKay of NASA’s Ames Research Center. “The proposal of H2O2 life on Mars is highly speculative, but it is interesting because it can be tested - possibly as soon as next summer with the instruments on the Phoenix mission to the Martian North Polar Region.
Richard Quinn, SETI Institute, however, is skeptical that Viking may have found hydrogen peroxide life on Mars. The reasons, he says, have to do with temperature and humidity. Houtkooper says, “But there are some good grounds to think that life exists on Mars and we may find it with Phoenix lander next year, so we are fairly tense about what will happen. It may give a new perspective on astrobiology”.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 5th, 2008 at 12:58 pm and is filed under Space Agency News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
