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Latest Case for Martian Life May Just Be Hot Air
ScienceNOW Daily News ^ | 5 August 2009 | Phil Berardelli

Posted on 08/08/2009 9:43:07 AM PDT by neverdem

Enlarge ImagePicture of methane

Conundrum. Researchers can't predict why methane (red and yellow areas) is so spotty in the Martian atmosphere.

Credit: NASA

Just as researchers were once again getting their hopes up, a new study undercuts the prospects for martian life. Scientists have discovered that methane in the martian atmosphere, one of the primary signals that biological processes may be at work today on the red planet, is behaving in unexplainable ways. The results challenge the latest evidence suggesting that Mars is--or was ever--inhabited.

Mars has been a roller coaster for astrobiologists. In 1996, for example, researchers reported that a martian meteorite found in Antarctica contained traces of microbial fossils. But subsequent research discredited the idea. More recently, the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA's) two rovers and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have found plentiful evidence that liquid water once flowed on the planet's surface. But none of those discoveries has led to undisputed proof that living organisms swam in Martian pools.

The latest buzz about possible Martian life started last January when a 5-year study confirmed the existence of methane in the martian atmosphere. Methane is the strongest sign yet that biology is at work on our planetary neighbor, because it is produced almost exclusively by living organisms.

But the way the methane is distributed in the martian atmosphere argues against a biological origin, researchers report tomorrow in Nature. The methane is concentrated in a single part of the atmosphere (see picture). The problem, say chemists Franck Lefàvre and François Forget, both of the Universitaire Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris, is that whether or not life is responsible for the emissions--and even if martian organisms were located only in one area of the planet--the methane should have spread much more uniformly through the atmosphere by now. The fact that it hasn't, the researchers say, argues for some sort of chemical reaction in the atmosphere that is destroying the gas before it can spread. And any reaction that destroys methane would also destroy life because the gas is made from the same types of molecules that make up life as we know it.

There's no doubt "that something is rapidly destroying the methane in the martian atmosphere," says planetary scientist Michael Mischna of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Whatever is responsible, he says, "there's no way life could survive at or near the surface if [methane] destruction occurred so quickly."

Planetary scientist Itay Halevy, of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, agrees. The rapid destruction of methane on Mars is a "disturbing" discovery, he says.


TOPICS: Astronomy; Science
KEYWORDS: astrobiology; mars; methane; photochemistry; science; xplanets
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1 posted on 08/08/2009 9:43:08 AM PDT by neverdem
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To: neverdem

There’s certainly plenty of intellectual hot air to go around.


2 posted on 08/08/2009 9:44:35 AM PDT by dr_who
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To: dr_who

They’re busy chasing government grants.


3 posted on 08/08/2009 9:47:48 AM PDT by Bratch
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To: neverdem; KevinDavis

We should try Alpha Centuri. it’s only 4.35 ly away.


4 posted on 08/08/2009 9:49:27 AM PDT by Perdogg (Sarah Palin-Jim DeMint 2012 - Liz Cheney for Sec of State - Duncan Hunter SecDef)
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To: neverdem; KevinDavis

The atmosphere is thin and escapes continually, it might be possible all of it just drifted off into space...

I guess


5 posted on 08/08/2009 9:52:00 AM PDT by GeronL (Guilty of the crime of deviationism.)
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To: neverdem

No amount of evidence against life on Mars will deter NASA from spending billions of dollars and some number of lives to continue the search.

MARS: The Search for Life, It’s a Jobs Program!


6 posted on 08/08/2009 9:54:11 AM PDT by count-your-change (You don't have be brilliant, not being stupid is enough.)
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To: neverdem
Clearly, the Martians need to promptly enact Cap and Trade if they are to survive.
7 posted on 08/08/2009 9:55:31 AM PDT by Zakeet (Obama: Always wrong, never in doubt.)
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To: dr_who

I know for a fact that Martians only fart once a year.


8 posted on 08/08/2009 9:56:09 AM PDT by Dr. Bogus Pachysandra ( Ya can't pick up a turd by the clean end!)
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To: count-your-change
No amount of evidence against life on Mars will deter NASA from spending billions of dollars and some number of lives to continue the search.

Life on other planets is the secular humanists' substitute for God. It's an article of their faith that it must be there, whether they have any evidence for it or not.

9 posted on 08/08/2009 10:04:45 AM PDT by Mojave (Don't blame me. I voted for McClintock.)
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To: neverdem

NASA makes more money by looking for life and then still more money by discrediting all evidence that life exists beyond Earth. One would not like to disturb the paradigm.


10 posted on 08/08/2009 10:04:49 AM PDT by PIF
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To: Mojave

Armed with the belief that life came into existence on its own here on earth then it must’ve came into existence everywhere OR maybe life on earth came from Mars.

Evidence? That’s on Mars!


11 posted on 08/08/2009 10:11:21 AM PDT by count-your-change (You don't have be brilliant, not being stupid is enough.)
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To: Mojave

I have $100 that says we will find at least microbes on Mars. Any takers? I have made this bet with several people here on FR.

There is already a lot of evidence that there is life on Mars, e.g., rocks that turn green (lichens?) in Summer and brown in Winter. The Allen Hills meteorite had clear evidence, i.e., nanofossils, in its interior. Those nanofossils are almost identical to certain Earth microbes.

BTW, how is this a religious issue? There are a lot of things in science that are not addressed in the Bible.


12 posted on 08/08/2009 10:51:51 AM PDT by darth
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To: darth
The Allen Hills meteorite had clear evidence, i.e., nanofossils, in its interior.

I didn't think that was clear at all. I wouldn't be surprised if they find microbes on Mars but I wouldn't want to lose $100 by betting on this meteorite.

13 posted on 08/08/2009 10:55:48 AM PDT by wideminded
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To: neverdem

14 posted on 08/08/2009 10:58:55 AM PDT by dfwgator
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To: darth
I have $100 that says we will find at least microbes on Mars.

Which will have arrived there on a meteorite from Earth.

15 posted on 08/08/2009 11:04:36 AM PDT by Mojave (Don't blame me. I voted for McClintock.)
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To: wideminded; darth
The "clear evidence" claim for fossils in the Allen Hills meteorite was debunked years ago.

"The new paper reports that magnetite, an iron-bearing mineral found in Martian meteorite ALH84001, was likely caused by inorganic processes, and that those same processes can be recreated in the laboratory, forming magnetite identical to that found in the Mars meteorite."

http://www.astrobio.net/index.php?option=com_news&task=detail&id=1090

16 posted on 08/08/2009 11:11:51 AM PDT by Mojave (Don't blame me. I voted for McClintock.)
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To: Mojave

I saw the meteorite and examined the photos at Johnson Space Center where I met the researchers. Someone may think they have “debunked” the observations. However, the nanofossils have a distinctive shape as well as the magnetite signature.

If you are 100% sure that life will not be found on Mars, then take my bet.


17 posted on 08/08/2009 11:15:31 AM PDT by darth
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To: darth
You saw magnetite, which your blind faith transformed into fossils in your own mind.

If you are 100% sure that life will not be found on Mars

I debunked that strawman already. Meteorites from Earth have hit Mars.

18 posted on 08/08/2009 11:19:18 AM PDT by Mojave (Don't blame me. I voted for McClintock.)
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To: Mojave

DNA analysis will provide proof as to whether microbes on Mars came from Earth or the other way around.

Note that since Earth’s gravity well is much deeper, an asteroid strike sending ejecta into an escape orbit would have to be much more powerful than a comparable strike on Mars. The energies involved (the ejecta would have to attain at least 11 km./sec to escape) would be more likely to sterilize the microbes.

I would not rule out microbes going Earth to Mars.

No takers for the bet?


19 posted on 08/08/2009 11:20:43 AM PDT by darth
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To: darth
The energies involved (the ejecta would have to attain at least 11 km./sec to escape) would be more likely to sterilize the microbes.

1. Source the invented fact.

2. So what?

20 posted on 08/08/2009 11:23:51 AM PDT by Mojave (Don't blame me. I voted for McClintock.)
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