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Antarctic Microbes Could Live on Mars

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the if-they-can-make-it-there-they'll-make-it-anywhere dept.

eldavojohn writes "Recent research has shown that microbes found in an Antarctic lake could survive the coldest temperatures on Mars. From the article, 'And they found that these species of microorganisms "huddled" together in colder temperatures to form a chemically linked unit called a biofilm. The finding marks the first time this phenomenon has been detected in the Antarctic species of so-called extremophiles. The findings provide more evidence for the ideas that liquid found beneath Mars' surface could harbor microbial life and that life could exist elsewhere in the solar system and galaxy, which is generally incredibly cold.' Their genes are currently being sequenced to determine which give the organisms 'cold-shock' proteins and their resistance to cold."

4 of 117 comments (clear)

  1. Study hot life instead by Harmonious+Botch · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Ok, so life can exist where it is really cold. But it will be SLOW. It will do things slowly, it will evolve slowly. And it will probably be too slow to have become intelligent yet. In short: it will be boring.
    We can learn a lot more by studying something with a time scale several orders of magnitude faster.
    We should be looking for life that can exist at our temp and time scale, or even higher and faster. It is likely to have evolved more, and has a better chance of being intelligent. Focus on finding life on Venus, not Mars. If it is not there, start it by seeding with a few designed high-temp organisms. We could learn a lot by studying it.
    And if it eventually out-evolves us, then it probably will regard us as boring, and will leave us alone.

    1. Re:Study hot life instead by El+Torico · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You're missing a big possibility - terraforming Mars. Mars is a far better candidate for terraforming than Venus. What we learn about these microbes could be useful in engineering microbes (and possibly other forms of life) that could thrive on Mars.

      --
      In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is usually crucified.
    2. Re:Study hot life instead by Laur · · Score: 4, Interesting
      Mars is a far better candidate for terraforming than Venus.

      While perhaps true, terraforming anything is so far ahead of our technological curve it is staggering. Far more interesting to me is initial colonization, and of the two, Venus is actually far more hospitable that Mars, at least as long as you don't mind living in floating cities about 50 km up. Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonization_of_Venus for the basics.

      --
      When you lose something irreplaceable, you don't mourn for the thing you lost, you mourn for yourself. - Harpo Marx
    3. Re:Study hot life instead by Hugonz · · Score: 5, Funny

      Yeah, that would be interesting. As for the time being, we are marsiforming Terra.