May 7, 2021
New research suggests that the Mars underground has the right ingredients for present-day microbial life.
Planetary scientist Jesse Tarnas of Brown University and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory led a new study on the possibility of microbial life beneath the surface of Mars. Here he is at the Kidd Creek Mine in Canada, sampling groundwater 1.5 miles (2.4 km) underground. Image via University of Toronto Stable Isotope Laboratory/ Jesse Tarnas.
Has life ever existed on Mars? Could there still be life somewhere on the planet today? Those are still unanswered questions, but growing evidence over the past few decades has suggested that ancient Mars was quite habitable, at least for microscopic organisms. Evidence for the possibility of the existence