Mars Rover Detects Never-Before-Seen Organic Compounds In New Experiment

NASA's Curiosity rover has identified a diverse set of organic molecules on Mars, including a nitrogen-bearing compound similar in structure to DNA precursors. The finding strengthens the case that ancient organic material can survive in the Martian subsurface, though it does not prove past life because the compounds could also come from geology or meteorites. Phys.org reports: The study was led by Amy Williams, Ph.D., a professor of geological sciences at the University of Florida and a scientist on the Curiosity and Perseverance Mars rover missions. Curiosity landed on Mars in 2012 to find evidence that ancient Mars had conditions that could support microbial life billions of years ago; the Perseverance rover, which landed in 2021, was sent to look for signs of any ancient life that might have formed.

Among the 20-plus chemicals identified by the experiment, Curiosity spotted a nitrogen-bearing molecule with a structure similar to DNA precursors -- a chemical never before spotted on Mars. The rover also identified benzothiophene, a large, double-ringed, sulfurous chemical often delivered to planets by meteorites. "The same stuff that rained down on Mars from meteorites is what rained down on Earth, and it probably provided the building blocks for life as we know it on our planet," Williams said. The findings have been published in the journal Nature Communications.

life came from organic compounds

[FudRucker]

This gives credence to the hypothesis of panspermia and could upgrade it from hypothesis to theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

Re:life came from organic compounds

[MightyMartian]

Panspermia would require that life itself was raining down on the terrestrial planets. Precursors would simply indicate there were a lot of strange and complex organic compounds falling on to the surfaces of planets like Earth, Mars and Venus, and were also likely constituents of bodies like Europa and Titan (well, we know Titan is covered in a literal hydrocarbon stew). What this discovery indicates, at the very least, is there was indeed a lot of organic compound in the early solar system and these organic compounds, at least on Earth, led to abiogenesis. Panspermia would advocate abiogenesis happened at some undetermined point further back.

If we find other life in the solar system, such as in Europa's or Ganymede's oceans, and it has DNA or some very close relative, with similar translation and transcription systems as we find in archaea and bacteria on Earth, then that would be a very strong argument that life in the solar system had a common origin. If however, there is no clear relationship between the two populations; say, they use something similar to DNA, but the genetic codes are different (all extant life on Earth uses the same canonical genetic code mapping codons to amino acids, strongly suggested the canonical code evolved prior to the Last Universal Common Ancestor), then we're very likely looking at an example of convergent evolution, and not in fact at two related populations.

Re:

[FudRucker]

This answers that
https://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=23972220&cid=66106504

Displacing the question

[Errol backfiring]

Funny how lots of theories only displace the question. If life came from space, it only displaces the question of how it was formed in the first place. The same is true for religious origin of everything (where did the chaos come from? and where did God come from?) and its scientific counterpart. Replace the chaos with the "soup" of matter and energy and God with the mysterious instability, and it is immediately clear that there is very little difference between the two. Neither answer the question of how i

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[Anonymous Coward]

If complex organics are fairly ubiquitous than it is like asking where salt came from, what with all this sodium and chloride laying around. Surely a deity did it.

Building blocks origins

[Mystic102]

Why would the building blocks originate from meteorites instead of being created on Mars or Earth? How would theses building blocks have been created on meteorites?

Re: Building blocks origins

[FudRucker]

They more than likely come from everywhere, stars that go supernova and explode, volcanic activity on planets, meteors come from somewhere like the guts of exploded stars. So trying to pinpoint a single origin is futile and pointless.

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[OrangAsm]

Every quadrant thinks it's the alpha quadrant.

Re:

[MightyMartian]

Well, first of all, hydrogen is the most common element in the universe, and carbon makes up something like 0.5% of the total observed mass of the universe (it's the fourth most common element), so along with other trace elements like sodium, phosphorus and the like, we're simply looking for places where there is sufficient energy to create the necessary reactions to produce organic compounds. No lack of energetic sources, in particular stellar system formation. Indeed many comets and asteroids host a lot o

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[znrt]

they could have originated on earth but it seems more probable that they did in meteorites due to more favorable conditions, and earth is just one specific point in the vastness of space whith many possible sources and meteorites and showers moving stuff around.

Re: Building blocks origins

[FudRucker]

The earth is made from the same stuff the rest of the rocky planets in the universe is made of = dead star guts, life started on earth because the environmental conditions was conducive to life

https://theboomerbible.com/tbb1.html

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[znrt]

what has this to do with where and how the precursor materials might have originated or come from?

Geoff. ?

[rossdee]

Geoff is sometimes spelt Jeff.