NASA has been looking for traces of life on Mars for years. As one researcher suspects, however, life could long have existed on the red planet.
Washington / Kassel – The US space agency NASA has been researching life on Mars * for years. But even if one day traces of living beings are discovered on the red planet, a researcher fears that these will not be extraterrestrial organisms.
Geneticist Christopher Mason told the BBC that NASA may have accidentally left terrestrial microbes on Mars in the past. In the course of its Mars missions, the US agency sent around 30 spaceships and rovers to the planet.
Video: New NASA images could point to life on Mars
Mars: “Evolutionary selection process” in NASA laboratories could make life possible
That would actually be possible – despite extreme precautions on the part of NASA. Because keeping a spaceship completely free of microorganisms is very difficult, said Mason. According to him, there is even evidence that the red planet has already been contaminated with microbial life from the past Mars missions. Maybe even with dangerous organisms.
The clean rooms of the Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL) of NASA could be to blame for this, which inadvertently acted as a test field for terrestrial microbes. According to Christopher Mason, an “evolutionary selection process” emerges in the JPL that produces the organisms “which then have a greater chance of surviving a trip to Mars.” Mason himself examined the JPL for DNA and discovered microorganisms that were in the Able to attach to metal and withstand extreme cold and radiation.
| Mars | |
|---|---|
| Radius: | 3,389.5 km |
| Distance from the sun: | 227,900,000 km |
| Orbital time: | 687 days |
Terrestrial microbes on Mars: development could be dangerous
This development would be problematic because “new organisms can wreak havoc when they reach a new ecosystem,” says Mason. It is therefore important to “guarantee the protection and preservation of every life that exists somewhere in the universe.” Due to the new condition, it would be possible that the microbes transported from Earth to Mars mutate quickly. Therefore, it is not unlikely that NASA would wrongly classify the organisms as extraterrestrial. (Nail Akkoyun)
Most recently, scientists approached the question of whether humans could live on Mars with a study. In addition, a ninth planet may have been discovered in the solar system. * hna.de is an offer from IPPEN.MEDIA.
