Was there ever life on Mars? Scientists study 1.3 billion year old meteorite

A question arises in everyone’s mind about Mars. Since it is one of the closest planets to Earth, could there ever have been life here? Scientists have also been confused by this question for years. Continuous research is going on about this. There is a lot of hope that scientists will find a conclusive answer regarding this soon. NASA has set a goal to bring samples from Mars to Earth by 2030. These will be such samples from which evidence of life can be detected on Mars. However, scientists are studying the materials of Mars in the form of meteorites. Researchers at Lund University in Sweden have studied the 1.3-billion-year-old Martian meteorite Pink and found it to have had limited exposure to water. In other words, life was not likely to exist at that particular time and place.

Scientists used neutron and X-ray tomography. This is the same technique that will be used to study the samples brought by the Perseverance rover. This technique was used because scientists wanted to find out if there had ever been a large hydrothermal system suitable for life to flourish. X-ray tomography is a common method of studying an object without damaging it. Neutron tomography was used because neutrons are very sensitive to hydrogen.

Scientists hope to find hydrogen first to find life because we know that water is the first requirement for life. “We wanted to investigate how much the meteorite might have reacted with water when it was part of the Martian rock,” said the geology doctoral student at Lund University.

Research revealed that only a small part of the meteorite must have reacted with water. This means that the sample found on the upper surface of Mars did not have any material to shelter life at that time. This study of scientists has also been published in the journal named Science Advances. Scientists hope that their discovery will also be helpful for NASA scientists when they return to Earth with samples from Mars.