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Methane on Mars?
mbone writes "Two independent groups are claiming the detection of methane in the Martian atmosphere, one using the
Mars Express orbiter,
and the other using ground based telescopes. This detection, if confirmed, would be of great significance for the search of life on Mars, as Methane will not last long in the Martian atmosphere and thus must be renewed, presumably either by biological processes or by volcanic vents, which would be a good place for life to develop. The leader of the ground based astronomy team, Michael Mumma of the Goddard Space Flight Center, when asked if the methane was biological in origin, said 'I think it is, myself personally.'"
From Research Nebraska
Methane is the second-most abundant greenhouse gas. The world's agricultural livestock produce about 17 percent of the methane in the atmosphere. A byproduct of digestion, cattle and other ruminant animals produce methane when organisms in their stomachs called methanogens break down fiber in grasses and grains they eat.
Here are some pictures of the little critters, and here
This article states that Methane on Earth would have a life of 300 years and that on Mars it'd be shorter.
i ca l/story.jsp?story=505454
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/science_med
"Methane is destroyed by the intense ultraviolet radiation on Mars because the gas has a relatively short photochemical lifetime of about 300 years, so if it is present there must be something producing it continually, Professor Formisano said. "[Its presence] is significant and very important. If it is present you need a source," he added."
Methane is actually odorless. What you smell are mercaptans, which are either biologically generated along with methane, or, in the case of commercial gas, deliberately added to make leaks noticable.
Exponential growth.
-Colin
In addition...methane is light, very light. on earth it slowly diffuses to space, on mars, with less gravity, it would even be lost quicker.
>Because the Bible/Koran/etc doens't mention god creating life on other planets.
Not in so many words, but there's a Quran verse which translates as something like "Glory to God, who has created the heavens and the earth and scattered life among them". The first Muslims probably read that as a reference to birds or angels, but it's easy enough to see that verse as compatible with the existence of extraterrestrial life.
John 10:16
Dammit, you guys, methane is odorless.
Breakfast served all day!
And just because the organisms are living off methane, which is chemical energy, doesn't mean that the methane isn't created by other organisims.
If you read the article, it seems that the general consensus by NASA is that its virtually impossible for methane to be created without an organic source.
-Fred
"Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American Public." - H.L. Mencken
Also, the methane appears to be associated with a particular geological region. While it could be a methane rich comet, it would have to be a massive comet nucleus to be able to release that much methane. Also, it's quite unlikely that a cometary nucleus could survive impact with Mars - the ice and methane would be vaporized and widely dispered.
Life or some sort of residualt volcanic activity are still the more likely explanations.
With that said, this certainly is exciting news.
If there turns out to be life on Mars, the best way to go about proving that this life was not carried from Earth by space probes would be very easy.
All one would have to do is study the DNA structure of the Martian life. There would be stark differences between Martian life DNA and Earth life DNA. The best analogy of this I can put forward would be one dealing with snowflakes. On the base level snowflakes are exactly the same thing. They form the same way, and are made of the exact same stuff (ice), but the key difference here is that while there are many similarities, no two snowflakes are exactly the same.
While the base similarities would be the same, there would be sufficient differences in Martian microbe DNA to say with absolute resolve that "These are not Earth bacteria!"
James Lovelock was the guy who invented the current notion of 'Gaia'. Whether you agree or disagree with that idea I think you'll find the origin of it interesting. He was hired by JPL to devise ways of finding life on Mars. So he asked the question: How could we tell there is life on Earth ? And being a chemist he concluded the atmosphere is a dead giveaway. The oxygen in the air indicates life, so with a powerful telescope (he actually wanted to build a 1,000 inch scope to find life on the planets via atmosphere chemistry) you could find if life existed. His argument was not to look just for oxygen but to find if the atmosphere was far from chemical equilibrium ... that would be the telltale sign. Needless to say NASA was not impressed with the idea that they didn't really need to go to Mars to tell if life was there.
Here is one link. Doubtless there are others.
Bitter and proud of it.