NASA's Mars News Is Not Life, But Perchlorate

leighklotz writes "In an update to the little green men story of not-life-on-Mars, NASA has twittered: 'The buzz this weekend was due to an interesting soil chemistry finding, still preliminary, but now avail here:' where 'here' is NASA Spacecraft Analyzing Martian Soil Data. The exciting bit: 'Within the last month, two samples have been analyzed by the Wet Chemistry Lab of the spacecraft's Microscopy, Electrochemistry, and Conductivity Analyzer, or MECA, suggesting one of the soil constituents may be perchlorate, a highly oxidizing substance.' Also, 'NASA will hold a media teleconference on Tuesday, Aug. 5, at 2 p.m. EDT, to discuss these recent science activities.'"

Comments

Contamination?

[morgan_greywolf]

Perhaps I'm missing something obvious here, but how seriously are they considering the possibility of contamination? Because unless I'm remembering something wrong, perchlorates are most excellent oxidizers and hence commonly used in, oh, say, solid rocket fuel, among other things.

Re:Contamination?

[carps]

Wouldn't it be amusing if some joker, before launch, had sprinkled a handful of dirt into the analysis chambers? (And by "amusing", I mean in the "How close do you think I can steer this ocean liner to that iceberg?" sort of way.)

Or maybe the "How much more funding do you think us Martian soil scientists would get if there were something up there besides moon dust" sort of way.

I wonder if it was Freudian the way they used the word "exonerate", i.e. liberate from an accusation, instead of "eliminate"? Feeling guilty boys?

(For the record, I don't actually think anyone did anything.)

Re:Contamination?

[CptNerd]

Funny how Hollywood almost got it right: Robinsons Crusoe On Mars

Re:Contamination?

[ZackZero]

This may have already been stated below, but after reviewing Wikipedia's entry on perchlorate, it is worth noting that the compound is negatively ionic. More analyses will likely need to be conducted to determine the quantity of perchlorate relative to other substances that it can react with. All that was established was the presence of perchlorate; there is still a chance that it could have a concentration similar to that which exists in various parts of our planet.

So what exactly are they saying?

[loraksus]

Because it sure sounds like "whole heck 'o alot of rocket fuel just lying on top of frozen water on a planet with 38% of the gravity of Earth"

Sounds like it would make space travel / trips to / from Mars dramatically easier.

NASA using twitter?

[LostCluster]

I think the buried lead here is that the government is now microblogging. Wonder who they're following?

Listen To James Lovelock

[esldude]

He explained it to NASA over 40 years ago. There is no life on Mars because life would effect the atmosphere in ways discernible to us. There isn't any need to send missions to figure that out. It of course wasn't the answer NASA wanted from him. There could of course be evidence of life in the past, but it looks unlikely to have ever been the case. Still the missions to Mars on a hopeless search for life are cool.

Re:Listen To James Lovelock

[Ihlosi]

There is no life on Mars because life would effect the atmosphere in ways discernible to us.

So where'd all the methane come from ?

Or maybe not?

[anadem]

Or maybe not, based on data from the Viking missions:

http://www.space.com/news/spacehistory/viking_life_010728-1.html

"Photos taken on Mars' surface of a Viking magnetic experiment on both landers show material clinging to the magnets. That suggests to Levin that whatever the surface processes are on Mars, they are not innately highly oxidizing. A highly oxidizing soil would convert magnetized materials to oxidized forms. Therefore, the magnet would be free of such particles.

"Similarly, the Mars Pathfinder mission in 1997, Levin added, also had significant amounts of magnetic material adhering to magnets attached to the spacecraft.

"Levin said that the paradigm of a Mars sterilized by a highly oxidizing surface is "too embedded in our scientific fabric to be set aside even by demonstrated proofs. He points to a John F. Kennedy quote that says 'the great enemy of truth is often not the lie --deliberate, contrived and dishonest -- but the myth -- persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.'"

Re:Ramifications?

[Whiteox]

It means that the free oxygen in the atmosphere had combined with available hydrogen and metals.
Simple put, Potassium/Sodium/Calcium had reacted with water or some hydrogen based acid - perhaps as gas forming a hydride and any free oxygen reacted with that compound to make a perchlorate!
Stunning stuff if you think about it.
If true, it's a real bonus for survival.

Re:I never...

[FooBarWidget]

Or maybe Twitter is more useful than the average Slashdotter wants to believe. I was baffled last time when I read the Slashdot reactions on Identi.ca and microblogging. Apparently people here have never heard of microblogging as a way to keep in touch with one's friends.

Re:Ramifications?

[mcvos]

The presence of a highly oxidizing substance would imply that organic matter is attacked and degraded quickly. If a high level of perchlorates is present on the surface of mars this could mean that it is a barren place devoid of organic life as we know it.

(This is chlorex after all, remember you use it to kill germs?)

Oxygen was also highly toxic to the first life on earth. Life found a way to cope with it.

So if there's life on Mars, it's breathing perchlorate.

Re:This would clear up a few things

[khallow]

Dr. Levin's Labeled Release experiment showed a strong positive response for life. Here is the crazy part and the part your mistaken about - all similar experiments on the Viking missions did as well.

There were no similar experiments to the labeled release experiment.

Now we have one experiment giving us two results. Percolates in one sample none in another.

A simple explanation is that perchlorates aren't uniformly distributed. At a glance, it appears the first sample, the one that didn't find perchlorates, was taken from dust above the layer of ice, and the second was taken from the ice layer. That actually makes sense since water, even in ice form is a good source of oxygen and an easy way to transport ions (like chlorine and perchlorate) around, you just need to knock the hydrogen off (say via occasional exposure to sunlight and UV radiation) to get an oxydizing environment in which perchlorates can form and let your ions migrate.

Extremophiles?

[JumperCable]

Do we have any extremophiles that life in a highly oxidizing environment?

Re:Extremophiles?

[Ihlosi]

Do we have any extremophiles that life in a highly oxidizing environment?

Yes. Most of it likes its oxygen as a gas, though, and not as part of a solid compound. Compared to what Earth was like when life began, it is a highly oxidizing environment now. Life hasn't just adapted to cope with it, it has literally become addicted to the stuff.

Re:Oxidizer

[GargamelSpaceman]

Hmm, also, those oxygen generating candles they use to supply oxygen to the facemasks that drop down in airplanes are perchlorate. So to generate oxygen for mars space missions may be as simple as diging it out of the ground and lighting it off..

same as Viking results?

[peter303]

Viking explicitly tested for "biological activity" and had a false-positive result due to an oxidizing soil. I think they blamed it on a peroxide at that time, but Viking didnt have as accuratate analyszers as Phoenix has.
I recall it was Carl Sagan who suggested biological life was locally anti-entropic and one should look for chemical disequilibriums like free oxygen or methane. Over time these substances naturally move into lower energy states through chemical reactions if life wasn't present. However, planetary surfaces and interiors may not be closed energy systems. Mars soil is bombarded by solar UV; Io is heated by Jupiter tidal stress. These energy injections can create life-like chemical disequilibriums too.

Re:Making oxygen is one thing....

[osu-neko]

It ought to be able to hold an Earth-like atmosphere indefinitely. It's not like an Earth-density atmosphere is anywhere near as dense as an atmosphere could be on an Earth-sized body. Two bodies to consider: Venus has an atmosphere much thicker than Earth's -- 90 atmospheres pressure at surface level, and Titan also at an atmosphere thicker than Earth's, with only a fraction of the mass of Mars. Mars is most definitely not too small to hold a dense atmosphere. It just doesn't happen to at the moment.