Will Life be found on Mars?

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  • OK but how many oxygen bottles have to be transported to Mars to facilitate the guys working on "oxygen creation" from a drop of water? I am not being facetious but will they be expected to travel back to Earth for a refill? Its all an excuse to garnish funding.

  • You are spot on - they must think we are stupid.

    I have had many a discussion with people after the raise a news report about "water drop, the size of a grain of Rice, found on Mars" - they talk on and on about actually living on Mars and how we "will soon be living there"??? I then reply ... "so where is the Oxygen, how do you breathe"??? No one has ever answered that.

    You're the only one who's ever shared by global view. Will you marry me? :*   :/ Although certain conditions will apply! =O

  • Back to topic:

    The water that once flowed on Mars contained just the right ingredients to support life, scientists say.

    Measurements by Nasa's Curiosity rover, which has been exploring the Red Planet since landing there in 2012, suggest the chemistry of its oceans would have been similar to those here on Earth.

    Mars is among the places in the Solar System with the best chance of having once hosted life, with water - essential for almost all known forms of life - known to exist there in large quantities.

    The ice on its surface contains enough water to cover the whole planet to a depth of 35 metres, and it is thought that billions of years ago a denser atmosphere and higher temperatures allowed vast amounts of liquid water to exist.

    No evidence has yet been found that life ever existed on the planet, but scientists have recently looked to find out what its oceans contained and whether they could have supported life.

    Full story and pictures on link.

  • https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-53584405

    Seems like a new space race has begun as this is the third launch of a probe to Mars within eleven days. The Chinese and UAE have already sent probes.

    Hopefully, if there's microbes there, then one of these probes might find them.

  • The moment of truth has arrived for the US space agency's Perseverance rover.

    The six-wheeled robot is fast approaching Mars after a seven-month, 470-million-km journey from Earth for what unquestionably will be the most challenging part of its mission.

    Big day in space exploration this evening as NASA's latest probe lands on Mars, plus it has its own helicopter too. Mars will be located in the Southern sky near the Moon for skywatchers. Lets hope it's a clear night.

    Catch all the action live from 7.15 tonight:

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  • The surface of mars isn't hospitable to life. It's dry and cold... getting down to around -140 deg C.

    It has a thin atmosphere that can't block ultraviolet radiation from space and that would devastate any known living thing on the surface of the planet.

    However....... Mars is as old as Earth and it may have been a bit more hospitable in the past. There are indications that water once flowed there (but again, the thin-ness of the atmosphere means it would most likely have boiled off into space long ago).

    Some astronomers suggest that Mars' early atmosphere was rich enough in carbon dioxide to create a greenhouse effect that would warm the surface. In other words, early Mars may have been a bit like early Earth. If Mars had been warm and wet for millions.... or even billions... of years, life may have been able to emerge.

    When conditions turned nasty, any life that had evolved became extinct but could have left traces of their existence behind in fossils.

    If we continue the comparison with Earth, it's remotely possible that some micro organisms may have survived several miles underground, as has happened here.

  • IIRC this mission will collect samples and then place them in an isolation container to be picked up and transported to Earth in a future multipart mission.

    If there's any life now I would suspect it would be microbial and probably well underground.

  • This flight has to be under full computer control as the signals take over 9 minutes to go from Mars to Earth or vice versa so "real time" flight control isn't possible.

  • I'm still trying to wok out how it flies with no atmosphere. It can't create it's own air so how is it getting lift. That's how planes and helicopters fly, even small drones and birds. Without any atmosphere to hold it up under the power of propulsion it would just fall to the ground.

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