Posted on 11/20/2012 7:03:34 PM PST by Free ThinkerNY
Scientists working on NASA's six-wheeled rover on Mars have a problem. But it's a good problem.
They have some exciting new results from one of the rover's instruments. On the one hand, they'd like to tell everybody what they found, but on the other, they have to wait because they want to make sure their results are not just some fluke or error in their instrument.
It's a bind scientists frequently find themselves in, because by their nature, scientists like to share their results. At the same time, they're cautious because no one likes to make a big announcement and then have to say "never mind."
The exciting results are coming from an instrument in the rover called SAM. "We're getting data from SAM as we sit here and speak, and the data looks really interesting," John Grotzinger, the principal investigator for the rover mission, says during my visit last week to his office at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. That's where data from SAM first arrive on Earth. "The science team is busily chewing away on it as it comes down," says Grotzinger.
SAM is a kind of miniature chemistry lab. Put a sample of Martian soil or rock or even air inside SAM, and it will tell you what the sample is made of.
Grotzinger says they recently put a soil sample in SAM, and the analysis shows something earthshaking. "This data is gonna be one for the history books. It's looking really good," he says.
Grotzinger can see the pained look on my face as I wait, hoping he'll tell me what the heck he's found, but he's not providing any more information.
(Excerpt) Read more at npr.org ...
most likely it’s something more like a cigarette butt than simple chemistry
The Rover found Jimmy Hoffa’s body.
They found that U.S. flag that Congresswoman Shelia Jackson Lee said Neil Armstrong had planted on Mars?
Obama’s College Transcripts or Biden’s brain.
Hard to read this any other way, except that the rover’s instruments have indicated irrefutable evidence for past or present life on Mars.
Even if it’s only microbial, it’s the gateway to a new paradigm.
Obama’s birth certificate?
They found A E I O U and sometimes Y
Why even say anything until you're ready to say something? Drama queens.
The news from Mars is “earthshaking?!” (Maybe they found Immanuel Velikovsky up there?)
They didn’t find a damn thing up there that will change anything of any real/practical/everyday importance here.
I would not be a bit surprised.
A chemical analyst that could possibly indicate that there was life on Mars at some time in history? Or not.
Must be budget time over at NASA. Startling new discovery that will probably amount to nothing. We get these discoveries every year around budget time.
They found a beeber like device
I’ll bet they found a rock. NASA finds more rocks than Charlie Brown finds in his Halloween bag.
Martian Latrine ?
You don’t think the existence of life on another planet is a significant discovery? I think if it’s true it will be one of the most important discoveries in history. Some will greet it with excitement and some with dread.
Fascinating.
If there is life on Mars, it came from Earth anyway.
violent eruptions at the beginning of the Genesis judgment sent jets of water into orbit, creating the comets, and there is no reason not to believe that some of that water would have hit other planets, or moons.
They found John Boehner’s spine?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.