The internet is awash with news that NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has detected carbon compounds on Mars. Some people may have you believe that the news suggests there’s life on Mars—but don’t get too excited just yet.
Carbon compounds…
One of Curiosity’s main goals is to hunt out organics on Mars. These are carbon-based molecules that we take for granted on Earth, but which are the fundamental blocks from which carbon-based life forms are built. Finding them could suggest that life exits—or did exist—on Mars.
The news from NASA shows that, when soil was tested using Curiosity’s onboard chemistry set, carbon, hydrogen and chlorine were present and capable of reacting with each other to form organic compounds. Tantalizing. Does that mean, then, that there’s life on the planet?
via Gizmodo
December 4, 2012
