According to a professor of astrobiology, life on Mars was first found 50 years ago but was immediately wiped off. A faculty member at the Technical University of Berlin named Dirk Schulze-Makuch has made the astounding allegation that humanity may have accidentally destroyed alien life after being lucky enough to find it.
NASA had started the Viking programme in the middle of the 1970s, delivering two landers to the Martian surface before the Curiosity rover. The expedition, which was ahead of its time, succeeded in giving humanity the first sight of the Martian surface. Additionally, the mission conducted biological investigation on the soil with the main objective of discovering signs of life.
Numerous geological formations in the mission’s findings were compatible with the results of significant water flows. The Martian volcanoes and the slopes on them were very similar to those in Hawaii, suggesting that they had formerly been wet.
Small quantities of chlorinated organics were also found by the landers, which were first thought to represent pollution from Earth. The presence of native organic molecules on Mars has been verified by later Mars missions, however they are present in chlorinated form.
A Viking experiment entailed soaking soil samples in water. The radioactive carbon (carbon-14) and nutrients from the water were added to the red Martian soil. According to the theory, any possible bacteria on Mars would eat the nutrients and expel gas made of radioactive carbon after consuming them. Initial findings suggested the release of this radioactive gas, but later findings were not definitive.
According to Schulze-Makuch, it’s possible that we killed off these potential germs by outnumbering them.
“Water was applied to the soil samples in several of the Viking tests, which might account for the perplexing outcomes. He speculated in a Big Think essay that “perhaps the putative Martian bacteria obtained for the tagged release tests couldn’t manage with that much of water and killed off after a period.
It would be as if an extraterrestrial spacecraft saw you roaming about in the desert half-dead and said, “Humans require water. To save it, let’s drop the person in the middle of the ocean. That also wouldn’t work, he said.
The search for life on Mars by humanity
In order to determine if we are capable of colonising other planets, humanity has been looking for life there. Mars has long been suggested as a location where this would be feasible.
The Perseverance rover is currently navigating Mars’ challenging terrain. It is a member of a global, interplanetary relay team established to discover the mysteries of our neighbouring planet.
A Sample Retrieval Lander is anticipated to be launched from Earth in the year 2028 with a NASA-led Mars rocket and two tiny Mars helicopters on board. The rocks that Perseverance gathered will be put onto the rocket once the lander lands close to a crater near the rover.
Notably, the transmission of Mars samples requires the lander to be near to the Perseverance rover. It must to land within 60 metres (66 yards) of the target area.
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