NASA's Curiosity rover is still going strong on the red planet, observing the atmosphere and analyzing soil samples for the sake of future missions. For instance, the agency has revealed that the rover has sniffed out sudden methane spikes in the atmosphere sometime in late 2013 and early 2014, coming from somewhere north of the rover's location in the Gale crater. The rover's Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) lab regularly analyzes the air on the planet and has found methane levels to be typically lower than scientists expect. During these sudden spikes, however, these levels are ten times higher than usual.
NASA believes that methane during these events erupt from an underground source every now and then, which means some process or reaction might be going on underneath the Martian surface. On Earth, methane is largely produced by human activities, the trash we dump in landfills, as well as animal and human waste. While it's possible that microbes that release methane waste are living on the planet, that doesn't automatically mean there's life on Mars, or even that it supported life long ago. "There are many possible sources, biological or non-biological," says Curiosity science team member Sushil Atreya, "such as interaction of water and rock."
As the Sarcastic Rover account posted on Twitter:
Martian Methane is NOT a canary in the coal mine of life. But like any dead bird, it's a good sign something might be worth a closer look.
- SarcasticRover (View the Original article
by Atul Singh
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