Scientists Strengthen Their Case That A Martian Meteorite Contains Signs Of Life
In April, Kathie Thomas-Keprta told a standing-room-only audience at the Astrobiology Science Conference that she had found evidence of life on a three-billion-year-old Martian meteorite. And no one was surprised. That's because she and eight other researchers at several universities and NASA's Johnson Space Center had reported the same thing about the same meteorite in 1996. They were met with criticism and ridicule back then. But this time, the reaction was more favorable. The five-pound rock in question was discovered in 1984 in the Transantarctic Mountains and is known as the Allan Hills Meteorite, or ALH84001 in astrobiology circles. Many scientists considered the gray-green meteorite a dead end, but the NASA team never stopped studying it and, thanks to improved microscopy techniques, the case for life on Mars is stronger than ever. "You can almost feel the tide turning," Thomas-Keprta says. "People are looking at our research again." The first time around,...