Mars Soil Appears To Be Able To Sustain Life 337
beckerist writes "Scientists working on the Phoenix Mars Lander mission, which has already found ice on the planet, said preliminary analysis by the lander's instruments on a sample of soil scooped up by the spacecraft's robotic arm had shown it to be much more alkaline than expected. Sam Kounaves, the lead investigator for the wet chemistry laboratory on Phoenix, told journalists: 'It is the type of soil you would probably have in your back yard, you know, alkaline. You might be able to grow asparagus in it really well. ... It is very exciting for us.'"
send seeds (Score:2, Interesting)
Lets see if it works. Send a bunch of seeds that we think will grow there. Of course the lack of water might be a problem. Are there any arctic cactus?
Re:FTA: (Score:1, Interesting)
What I now don't understand is why they didn't bring a small payload of seeds? What could possibly be lost? The eco-system can only be changed for the better (I think?!)
Re:send seeds (Score:5, Interesting)
Who cares about life - what about oil? (Score:1, Interesting)
I don't care if there are green martians with antennas living underground... I WANT OIL. At $135/barrel, I think it's still profitable enough to extract oil from Mars and ship it here. Is there oil, Phoenix Lander? IS THERE???
Re:AP News Article (Score:5, Interesting)
i.e. We're still missing the magic ingredient: Nitrogen. Getting a sufficient quantity of nitrates to Mars might end up being the biggest problem with colonization efforts in the future. We obviously have water. CO2 can be reprocessed into O2.
The soil is not toxic. Now all we need is Nitrogen and a good method of bootstraping industrial production on Mars. (Shipping heavier technology would be impractical.)
The Soil, Maybe, But What About the Environment? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:FTA: (Score:5, Interesting)
they go to great lengths NOT to bring life to mars. Read up on "bio-barrier". If the spacecraft get contaminated during construction or prep they have to re-sterilize it. They want to find life, not spread it.
If you accidentally bring life to Mars, that makes it about impossible to discover it and know for sure it's Martian life and not something you brought, or that mutated from something you brought.
Although I agree that if we determine there is NO life on mars, I say our next probe is sent with a well-planned variety of "colonizer" lifeforms to begin teraforming of the planet so it's at least borderline useful by the time we can send people out there.
Re:FTA: (Score:3, Interesting)
True, but if it exists elsewhere... water, soil, greenhouse with insulating cover for nighttime = food and oxygen. Terraforming Mars may be way, way off but if we could actually establish farms it'd be a huge asset for any expedition or colony there. A lot of the supplies to the ISS is food, the moon is a barren rock, but if Mars can sustain itself with the basics having a permanent colony doesn't look that unlikely anymore.
Not mutually exclusive (Score:3, Interesting)
The two endeavors are not mutually exclusive. Terraforming and manned exploration could occur in parallel.
Re:So... (Score:2, Interesting)
Would nuking it produce a similar effect?
>_>
Re:Growing Asparagus on Mars... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Design (Score:2, Interesting)
I'd actually disagree. ID claims the Earth was designed for life; it makes no particular claims about the rest of the solar system. If anything, ID's claim that the Earth is "special" could be interpreted to mean that the other planets can't support life (although even if the Earth is "special" it doesn't necessarily mean that).
However, if we discover that despite having the ability to support life Mars was completely sterile, that would support ID, IMHO. At least, it would shed a doubtful light on the probability of evolution: If evolution actually works the way it's supposed to, then a planet that "can" support life should eventually develop life if given enough time. Given the amount and variety of life found on Earth, Mars ought to have had enough time for a few microbes to have evolved at least.
Life is likely (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Growing Asparagus on Mars... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:FTA: (Score:3, Interesting)
The thing about life is it tends to spread. Chances are if we find nothing from taking a sampling from about 20 different areas and find nothing, there's a pretty good chance there is nothing.