Molecules indicating the presence of life on Mars have been found

NASA’s Mars Perseverance Program has detected organic carbon compounds in rocks from the soil of Jezero Crater on the Red Planet.

Unfortunately, this discovery cannot be considered evidence of life on Mars, but rather evidence that the building blocks of life exist, where organic matter can be produced both biologically and non-biologically – read NASA in her contacts.

This is an important milestone for a NASA project, even before the Perseverance landing on Mars, the research team wondered whether the rocks in the area were of sedimentary or volcanic origin.

„I am already beginning to despair that we will never find the answer. But then our PIXL instrument scanned the patch of eroded rock from the area known as South Sétah, and everything became clear: the crystals in the rock provided the evidence we needed.” Said Ken Farley, a California Institute of Technology researcher in Pasadena and a scientist on the Perseverance mission.

SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments Using Raman and Luminescence for Organics and Chemicals) In the area of ​​Jezero Crater, where was a huge lake and river delta.

Perhaps the bedrock that persevere has passed since landing in February has been magma glowing red, and the research team found that rocks in the crater had been in contact with water multiple times over thousands of years, so some of them contained organic molecules.

This discovery has implications for understanding key events in the history of the Red Planet and their exact timing, however, the preservation of organic matter in ancient rocks at Jezero Crater suggests that potential biological traces may have survived.