Mars Is Probably Not Home To Life, According To Sad New Study
Mount Sharp NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS A new analysis from the rover Curiosity found just one-sixth as much methane as previous studies. Methane gas can be a sign of microbial life, so this is disappointing news. Hold your horses (cows?), guys. A new analysis of data from the Curiosity rover found there's very little methane in the atmosphere of Mars. Methane gas can be a sign of biological activity-of microbial Martians, farting up the atmosphere-so we're feeling a bit disappointed. At most, the Martian atmosphere has a methane concentration of 1.3 parts per billion, according to the new analysis. That's one-sixth as much as previous estimates. The measurement means there's little chance methane-producing organisms are currently living on Mars, the researchers wrote in a paper they published today in the journal Science. The data came from Curiosity's Tunable Laser Spectrometer, which was specially designed to look for methane gas. The instrument has not detected any methane...