Is it time to revisit what NASA's Viking lander found on Mars in 1976?

[Admin]

A new study reconsiders the controversial findings of NASA's Viking Mars lander in 1976, which some argue may have shown signs of past life on the Red Planet.

Is it time to revisit what NASA's Viking lander found on Mars in 1976? : Read more

 

[Spaceman2001]

Back in 1976 the Viking Landers carried out 3 experiments on soil samples on Mars.
One of these was the Labelled Release, in which a liquid containing 7 potential nutrients tagged with Carbon-14 was added to the soil sample. The air above the soil was monitored to see if there was any radioactivity detected, which could be the result of microorganisms having metabolised the nutrient.

With both landers, this produced a positive result.

The soil samples were then heated for 3 hours and the test repeated. If the heating had killed off any life then no result would be produced.
This is exactly what happened!

However, the other two experiments - a gas chromatograph mass-spectrometer and the gas exchange - failed to give positive results.

It is now believed that the GCMS was limited in its ability to detect certain types of organic molecules at low concentrations, which could have meant it missed potential organic matter even if it was present.
So if its results are ignored, it is quite possible that we actually did find evidence of life on Mars almost 50 years ago!

The big question is of course why the experiments have never been repeated by more modern craft ...

Jerry Stone FBIS FRAS, Freelance Space Presenter

 

[billslugg]

They probably won't repeat this test because it probably is a crude test, easily fooled by other chemicals in the soil, (perchlorates). They have much better instruments now to identify the organic molecules indicating life.

 

[DarkMatterMuncher]

I love any potential exciting news like this! Glad there are still scientists looking into the archives of space exploration!

 

[Classical Motion]

We have so much recorded data from telescopes, space telescopes and system probes, some over decades old, that no one has viewed or looked at yet.

And the same with much more research data in many other fields.

It’s a problem. An AI task. It would take thousands of people many decades to review it all.

And we learn how to collect more data every year. We get further behind every year.

After looking at all the data, we encounter the real problem. What does the data mean?

This will take some intellect. And an another millennia.

I believe we have some questions, no matter how much data you have, can not be answered or determined.

Just a supposition from observation.

 

[Spaceman2001]

They probably won't repeat this test because it probably is a crude test, easily fooled by other chemicals in the soil, (perchlorates). They have much better instruments now to identify the organic molecules indicating life.

The basic question remains - why aren't we actively searching for evidence of life on Mars?

 

[billslugg]

It's not worth the effort right now. They don't think there is any chance of life on the surface due to cosmic ray bombardment. However, the instruments are designed to find the remnants of life, be it current life or past life. If there happens to be life on the surface, the instruments will detect life related compounds. An earnest search for life itself will not begin until we are able to drill down to the water table.

 

[Spaceman2001]

Why don't you think it's worth the effort? I believe that to find evidence on life on two worlds would be pretty important.
Aside from that, we need to know for sure if there's any life on Mars, because sterilising our spacecraft takes a lot of resources - including money.