signs of ancient life in Mars rover photos

Fascinating article implying structures on mars are fossils of ancient microbial life, the same as we see on ancient Earth

link

a reply to: Dr X

Ive always been fascinated by mars the face the pyramids the stories about the moons in gullivers travels.
Any one here think they would be brave enough to go in 2025......
The old total recall movie was cool .
Now me im keeping my happy butt on earth lol.
25 million miles away ...no food ...no water ...no air ...poison sunshine no women freeeeeeeezing cold and all the red dirt you want NO THANKS..............Oh yea not to mention the six month long trip in a tin can to get there Ill stay here and hold down the fort.

a reply to: sweets777

I would go, but not on that one way trip that was proposed a little while back. My thinking on the subject is, that before we even THINK about putting a human foot on Martian soil, we should improve our propulsion methods and the space ships themselves to the point where the journey would take a few weeks, rather than more than a handful of months. Anything else would be deeply irresponsible with regard to the lives of the people on any prospective mission.

We must always have a way back, and I think the best way to make that happen, is for NASA and the other space industry big shots, to get their heads together and build a spaceship that can leave Earth, get to Mars FAST, land, and take off again from there, a space craft which can do the whole journey. A proper space craft, not just a bomb with a few folks sitting on its nose cone.

a reply to: TrueBrit

Oh yea to hell with the one way trip .
But i think if they got there and they knew that they could just fail and come back then they would fail and come back .
I think it might be like when canada and usa were founded the people that came knew if they failed they were dead there was no going back i think at first thats how mars would have to be .But your right as the technology gets better you can take trips back and forth just like here

a reply to: sweets777

Well that's the thing though.

When we sent people to the Moon (all blather to the contrary aside of course) they went there with a mandate to land on the surface, collect samples, take measurements and readings of this and that, perform some rudimentary experiments, AND THEN COME HOME!

They were not sent up there with the express intention of leaving them there on that barren rock to live out the rest of their natural lives (which would have been rather short, given the limitations of life support tech back then). I think that explorers sent to Mars should be equipped and provided for such that they have AT LEAST as good a chance of making it home in one piece, as the people we have sent to the Moon.

People who are prepared to risk their lives for the sake of discovery are worth keeping alive, and worth any effort required to ensure their safe return home!

a reply to: sweets777

Yeah, but when they came, there was breathable air and game to hunt. Up there? Not so much.

a reply to: TrueBrit
There's a very great difference between a Moon round-trip and a Mars round-trip. It has to do with the inescapable facts of gravity.

Getting Apollo astronauts off the Moon was done with one little 3,500-lb thrust rocket engine. That's all it takes to escape lunar gravity. Mars is a whole different matter. The gravity at the surface is 40% Earth gravity, and it would take very substantial launch facilities to come home. Wernher Von Braun did the math back in 1956, and figured it could be done with 400 launches, assembling two super-giant rockets in Earth orbit. Even Robert Zubrin's Mars Direct project hypothetically requires two Ares launches, based on a massively enhanced Space Shuttle stack and a very long turnaround time while fuel is manufactured from Mars water.

Looks like Orion will be our next step in manned space exploration: Wiki link

that will be the type of vehicle used to get us to Mars, the most likely destination, from everything I have heard or read on the subject. Its a ways off though yet. I hope between now and then we gain even more proof that there was lots of water, a warm environment, and there was definitely some forms of life in the past, and maybe even as we speak.

a reply to: Dr X

Very interesting article and theory , thanks for the post

If that connection could be proved it would be massive.
NASA needs to pull its finger out !

a reply to: Dr X

Shame you didn't post a youtube video of lights in the sky , the thread would probably of gained some traction.

"The fact that she pointed out these structures is a great contribution to the field," says Penelope Boston, a geomicrobiologist at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology. "Along with the recent reports of methane and organics on Mars, her findings add an intriguing piece to the puzzle of a possible history for life on our neighboring planet."

"I've seen many papers that say 'Look, here's a pile of dirt on Mars, and here's a pile of dirt on Earth,'" says Chris McKay, a planetary scientist at NASA's Ames Research Center and an associate editor of the journal Astrobiology. "And because they look the same, the same mechanism must have made each pile on the two planets.'"
McKay adds: "That's an easy argument to make, and it's typically not very convincing. However, Noffke's paper is the most carefully done analysis of the sort that I've seen, which is why it's the first of its kind published in Astrobiology."

In her paper, she also describes alternative processes through which these could have formed. For instance, the chips, pits and cracks could be the product of erosion by salt, water, or wind.
"But if the Martian structures aren't of biological origin," Noffke says, "then the similarities in morphology, but also in distribution patterns with regards to MISS on Earth would be an extraordinary coincidence."
phys.org...

I would happily take a one way trip to Mars, am I the only person who thinks this world #ing blows?

Video of Nora Noffke explaining microbially-induced sedimentary structures or microbial mats.

Research by Old Dominion University geobiologist Nora Noffke gained national attention for discovering the earliest evidence of life - life that could exist (or have existed) on Mars.

a reply to: gortex

yeah I know! Science eh!

originally posted by: Eunuchorn
I would happily take a one way trip to Mars, am I the only person who thinks this world #ing blows?

Why would a place with nothing be better? Life is what you make of it...You would have less on Mars to be excited about..

This is just to suppress the internet stories of the Mars Coffin. As soon as it is found, this story goes up, taking over the search engine results. Easy to manipulate the internet.

a reply to: Vaedur

This is just to suppress the internet stories of the Mars Coffin.

Seriously ?
A story about possible evidence for the existence of life present or past on Mars has knocked a story about a rock on Mars off of search results , and that's bad ?
Did you read the linked article in the OP ?

The rock is a rock , if there is evidence for microbial mats on Mars that would be the story of all stories.

Jeesus there much be so much oil on mars. Sounds incentive enough to me.

originally posted by: Dabrazzo
Jeesus there much be so much oil on mars. Sounds incentive enough to me.

Anything of value found on Mars instantly becomes too expensive the minute you have to build huge rockets to get it back to Earth.

a reply to: Blue Shift

Im thinking it would mean we would then have the resources needed on a local level to kickstart cities on mars. Not bring it back to earth.

Turn earth into a utopian solar farm and rape mars for all its worth.