Living organisms likely under the surface of the planet.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: While the search for life on Mars remains ongoing, scientists have discovered Martian meteorites containing pockets of methane, lending credence to the notion that life could subsist off the gas on the Red Planet.
Nigel Blamey, who led the research at Brock University in Ontario, told The Guardian: “We must be clear that we have not detected life. However, if life exists on Mars, then we should be focusing on the subsurface,” where methane-eating microbes might be able to thrive in a “deep biosphere similar to that on Earth.”
Blamey and his team focused on six meteorites from Mars that serve as examples of volcanic rocks there, collecting samples about one-quarter of a gram from each — a little bigger than a 1-carat diamond. All the samples were taken from the interiors of the meteorites, to avoid terrestrial contamination, according to Discovery News.
The researchers found that all six released methane and other gases when crushed, probably from small pockets inside.
“The biggest surprise was how large the methane signals were,” Blamey told Space.com.
Furthermore, the study, published in Nature Communications, indicated that the most intact of the meteorites contained the highest methane concentrations, suggesting that the gas had not simply been introduced as the samples degraded on Earth.
The methane found by Blamey’s team is not the first to be associated with the possibility of life on Mars. In 2003, the European Space Agency’s Mars Express spacecraft first detected methane in the Martian atmosphere, while just last year NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover observed “wafts” of methane emanating from beneath the planet’s Gale Crater, suggesting that gas is still being produced on the planet today.