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BOLD Plan To Find Mars Life On the Cheap
techfun89 writes "There is a BOLD new plan for detecting signs of microbial life on Mars. The nickname is BOLD, which stands for Biological Oxidant and Life Detection Initiative, would be a follow-up to the 1976 Mars Viking life-detection experiments. 'We have much better technology that we could use,' says BOLD lead scientist Dirk Schulze-Makuch, with Washington State University. He elaborates, 'Our idea is to make a relatively cheap mission and go more directly to characterize and solve the big question about the soil properties on Mars and life detection.' To help figure out the life-detection mystery, Schulze-Makuch and his colleagues would fly a set of six pyramid-shaped probes that would crash land, pointy end down, so they embed themselves four to eight inches into the soil. One of the instruments includes a sensor that can detect a single molecule of DNA or other nucleotide."
Because there is bugger all down here on earth
Just run this as a joint mission between the US and the EU, problem solved.
Looks more like an all-caps plan to me.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
a set of six pyramid-shaped probes
So that's what the title of the Doctor Who episode was referring to! I wonder if the probes will locate Sutekh.