Some researchers who are funded by NASA are refining a tool that can detect chemical evidences of life on the red planet.
The instrument called Urey, has already proved its worth in detecting traces of life in the most hostile places on Earth. ESA has taken this tool from US as a payload on their ExoMars rover that is planned for a 2013 launch.
ExoMars rover will drill the surface of Mars and will then get a sample of soil from the bottom of the surface. This sample will then be ground in powder form and fed into the instrument which will then examine it for traces of chemical life activity.
Urey us a key instrument for that because it is one with the highest sensitivity for organic chemicals and can detect organic molecules such as amino acids, at concentrations as low as a few parts per trillion.
All life on Earth assembles chains of amino acids and this is the most important chemical that is to be searched for to determine life activity on the planet.
But the only presence of amino acids on the planet cannot be taken as a life activity as amino acids can also be formed by some non-biological processes. Like on Earth there are mainly two kinds of amino acids, called ‘right-handed‘ and ‘left-handed‘. The ‘right-handed’ ones are of concern and the ‘left-handed’ ones are just their mirror images.
The instrument then makes use of some other processes that finally determine the type of amino-acids that are found.
May be we are able to find amino acids on the red planet, yet we cannot be sure that there was or is life on Mars. For this we have to make a human landing on Mars or develop robots that can mimic human activity on the planet.
Via: redorbit
