The fungus on Mars and the man who thinks he found life on other planets CNET 5/6/2021
Perseverance prior to launch at NASA s JPL Jerry van Andel sat alone on the bow of the RV Lulu, a floating junkyard of a ship, as it bobbed against the waves of the Pacific Ocean. Across deck, a team of scientists bustled around a basket full of strange life forms, wrenched from a mighty crack in the Earth, 10,000 feet below the ocean s surface.
It was a momentous haul, but van Andel, an energetic Dutch oceanographer from Stanford University, wasn t dancing around the find with the rest of the team. He was deep in thought, propped up on the anchor windlass. A shipmate, John Porteus, noticed and shuffled over.