Mars robots may have destroyed evidence of life

Mars rovers, instead of looking for life, are destroying the "evidence" of life, although not intentionally. This was recently discovered and Mars exploration now needs a new think.

HAVE Mars landers been destroying signs of life? Instead of identifying chemicals that could point to life, NASA's robot explorers may have been toasting them by mistake.

The Phoenix and Viking landers looked for organic molecules by heating soil samples to similarly high temperatures to evaporate them and analyse them in gas form. When Douglas Ming of NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, and colleagues tried heating organics and perchlorates like this on Earth, the resulting combustion left no trace of organics behind. Ming's team presented their results at the recent Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Houston.

Jeffrey Bada of the University of California, San Diego, agrees that a new approach is needed. He is leading work on a new instrument called Urey for the European Space Agency's ExoMars rover, due to launch in 2016, which will be able to detect organic material at concentrations as low as a few parts per trillion. The good news is that, although Urey heats its samples, it does so in water, so the organics cannot burn up.

Source: www.newscientist.com...

This seems really stupid of them. I mean, why on earth would they put millions/billions into some project, without even testing it first?? You'd think they would of tried that, before launching the damn thing. What a waste of our money.

Considering how arrogant a lot of scientists are, they don't half make some really dumb mistakes.

[edit on 24-5-2009 by Alesanjin]

reply to post by sunny_2008ny


Ha, kinda funny. Really sounds like a 4 in the morning decision.

"Oh.. uh ... yeah! Burn it! Just burn it!"

I never knew that's how they have been testing for organic material on Mars.

I don't think it was a mistake, but I do believe it was a poor decision. You can't be mad though as there is plenty of Mars where that came from.

I think that another plan should be thought up, just before it become to late.

reply to post by Bryan LaVergne

I never knew that's how they have been testing for organic material on Mars.

US govt will not put something on Mars until NASA is convinced that the procedure for detecting organic matter on Mars is experimented here on earth first.

The article says that this is just a possibility that organic matter detection could be lost in Mars because of the present procedure of detection.

The official site on the Mars lander. There is a list of instruments that are on board

Aboard the deck of the Phoenix spacecraft are a suite of science instruments representing some of the most sophisticated and advanced technology ever sent to Mars. The following fact sheets provide details about the spacecraft and science instruments aboard Phoenix

Source: phoenix.lpl.arizona.edu...

reply to post by sunny_2008ny
There's a lot of 'mays,' 'maybes,' and 'suggests' in the article. Nevertheless, it's not a very reassuring read. It seems incomprehensible that years after the planning stages someone has said, "Hmmmm? Wait a minute there...what if...?"

No organic fragments have been detected by TEGA; although mass spectra are still being calibrated and analyzed by the Phoenix science team for possible organic fragments. We are currently examining the thermal analysis results for Phoenix soils, searching for exothermic peaks in the 300 to 500°C region. Viking GC/MS instruments did not detected organic molecules down to the parts per billion level [7]. Organics (if they exist) at the Viking sites may have been combusted by the thermal decomposition of perchlorate salts if perchlorate salts are more widespread in soils than just at the Phoenix landing site.

COMBUSTION OF ORGANIC MOLECULES BY THE THERMAL DECOMPOSITION OF PERCHLORATE SALTS: IMPLICATIONS FOR ORGANICS AT THE MARS PHOENIX SCOUT LANDING SITE.

Ultimately, the Mars missions are there to advance science and making (surprisingly big?) mistakes are part of the process. When the Euro Mars Exorover hits red soil, it will have the benefit of Viking/Phoenix experience. I'm hoping those methane emissions will be found to come from some microbes or extremophile critter

NASA, Scientists Not Ready to Give Up on Martian Life is a good article to highlight the learning curve in action...

Apparently it's the perchlorate in the soil that causes the organics to burn up and that was just discovered recently with the Phoenix lander.

But the amazing thing is that this gives NASA the opportunity to completely revise their stance on life on Mars.

This might be a real opportunity for disclosure in terms of admitting to life in the solar system.

Here's an interview with Richard Hoagland on Coast to Coast. He seems pretty excited about it.

Mars robots may have destroyed evidence of life

The article would more properly read:

"Mars Robots Have Destroyed Evidence of Life."

Nasa Employee 1: Hey guys we need to find away to analyze the soil to find organic life.

Nasa Employee 2: How we gonna do that?

Nasa Employee 1: I dunno.....

Nasa Employee 2: Lets just put an incinerator on it! We can test it out on this bag of pop corn!!

Nasa Employee 1: AWESOME!!

This proccess works here on Earth, but due to the soil composition on Mars, which wasn't discovered until the Phoenix lander made the discovery.

So, this is a case of unknown variables at the time of set up throwing off the results, not as much of a blunder as members are presenting, or a "Just burn it" idea either.

Originally posted by sunny_2008ny
Mars rovers, instead of looking for life, are destroying the "evidence" of life, although not intentionally. This was recently discovered and Mars exploration now needs a new think.

HAVE Mars landers been destroying signs of life? Instead of identifying chemicals that could point to life, NASA's robot explorers may have been toasting them by mistake.

It are not the Mars landers or whatever landers which been destroying signs of life on Mars in my opinion, because when reading the information below it is NASA itself that destroying/withholding the evidence for life on Mars so far.

The Viking spacecraft of 1975-76 had biochemical laboratories on board, allowing for the search for life in 3 experiments. These experiments provided, at last, interesting but inconclusive results: There must be some reactive matter at least in some of the probes investigated, but most scientists concluded that this would probably be non-biological. However, in 1997, Viking Life experimentator Gilbert V. Levin claimed that his experiments may have detected evidence for active microbial life on Mars.

seds.org...

In a scientific paper presented at the International Society for Optical Engineering in San Diego today, Viking life detection experimenter Dr. Gilbert V. Levin, President of Biospherics Incorporated, said he has now concluded that his experiment detected microbial life on Mars 21 years ago. Based on a re-evaluation of his and other Viking results coupled with new Martian and Earth relevant scientific data, Levin stated: "The only conclusion consistent with all the known facts is that the Viking Labeled Release Experiment discovered microorganisms in the soil of Mars." Levin also claimed that his paper, written before Pathfinder landed on Mars, is supported by images and data from that spacecraft.

www.biospherics.com...

Just my two euro-cents.

Originally posted by MrVertigo
But the amazing thing is that this gives NASA the opportunity to completely revise their stance on life on Mars. This might be a real opportunity for disclosure in terms of admitting to life in the solar system.

Finding life has always been one of the things NASA would like to do with these probes. They've always admitted the possibility of that, and have spent billions to see if it's true.

The only revision to their stance might be that after spending all this time and money and coming up completely empty-handed (which they have), now they have another chance to say, "Okay, this is how science works. You live and learn. We didn't have a good understanding of the soil before, and maybe our equipment didn't find life. But NOW we can fix that, and if you keep giving us billions of dollars, we'll try to get it right the next time!"

There was the Spirit rover who found water on mars and took a picture of what seems to be an extra terretrial.