The Antarctic Polar Ice Cap and Mars—Finding Life Forms
The journal Editor, Sherry L. Cady, Ph.D., Associate Professor in the Department of Geology at Portland State University, says, “This study demonstrates the importance of permafrost as a cryopreservant for microbial biosignatures . . . Antarctica permafrost provides a unique opportunity to demonstrate just how long dormant frozen life could survive in deposits that are considered one of the closest analogs of a possible Mars ecosystem.”
In 1980, the Mary Ann Libert, Inc. was formed to publish authoritative and the latest informative journals, books, and trade magazines—with specialized subjects chosen for this publishing company in areas of biotechnology, biomedical research, life sciences, clinical medicine, surgery, and law. This particular paper was in the field of astrobiology, exploring the secrets of life’s origin, evolution, distribution, and destiny in the Universe. And the latest informative subject chosen was the study of the Antarctic permafrost in order to compare the findings of life forms, as compared to the frozen ice regions on Mars.
The key seems to be populations of microorganisms found in ice. Analyzed samples of permafrost were collected from 20 boreholes that were drilled at five different sites, located in the Dry Valleys of Antarctica. Discovered was the actual presence of assorted populations of aerobic and anaerobic bacteria. The reason this was so exciting and important, was because the diversity of the species did not change, even though its number did with the age of the permafrost—which was more than 5 million years old. This meant the find represented the “oldest viable microorganism discovered in Earth’s permafrost.”
The proposal by the project’s researchers was the similarity between Earth’s permafrost and the Martian extraterrestrial habitat demonstrated an excellent model of the ecosystem on Mars, located in the frozen regolith. The isolation, stability, and dryness are environmental similarities that make this a possibility for study and a similar discovery of microorganisms demonstrating life forms on Mars.
The Northern Hemisphere–which effects northern Alaska, Russia, and Canada–has about 24% of permafrost in its terrestrial surface, with the perennially frozen ground important because of being a critical component of the cryosphere, in addition to the Arctic system. The 2003 U.S. Arctic Research Commission report, “Permafrost Task Force Report,” stated that permafrost “played three key roles in the context of climatic changes:”
· A record keep – temperature archive
· Translater of climatic change – subsidence and related impacts
· Facilitator of climatic change – impact on the global carbon cycle
This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007 at 5:26 am and is filed under Mission Objectives, 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.
