NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has made a groundbreaking discovery, detecting the largest organic molecules ever found on Mars. These complex carbon-containing molecules are significant because they are involved in biology on Earth and could be indicative of past life on Mars.
The discovery was made using the Sample Analysis at Mars (Sam) instrument on the NASA rover and consists of carbon atoms linked in long chains with other elements like hydrogen and oxygen. The organic molecules were found in a 3.7-billion-year-old rock called Cumberland, which is located in a lakebed area of Mars’ Gale Crater.
The researchers were initially looking for evidence of amino acids, the building blocks of proteins, but this unexpected finding is almost as exciting. Among the molecules detected were decane and dodecane, known as alkanes with 10 and 12 carbon atoms respectively. These are significant in the search for biosignatures on Mars, as they could be indicative of life.
The discovery has sparked hope that evidence of ancient life might still be detectable today. The sample from Cumberland has been analyzed many times using different experimental techniques and has shown evidence of clay minerals and smaller organic molecules found on Mars before.
However, the fact that these molecules exist intact today in samples exposed to harsh environments for millions of years gives astrobiologists hope that they could have formed through biological processes. Further analysis is needed to confirm this hypothesis.
The discovery is significant because it provides a critical record of Mars’ past habitability and could be used as chemical biosignatures, signs that life was once present on the planet. The findings are published in Proceedings of the National Academies of Science and offer a promising step forward in the search for life beyond Earth.
Source: https://www.sciencealert.com/nasas-unexpected-discovery-of-the-largest-organics-on-mars-explained