![]() In samples with such scarce biomass, we use highly sensitive laboratory methods to detect microbial life, including gene sequencing and visualising cells using microscopic analysis. However, the rovers’ current equipment wouldn’t be able to detect it on Mars. Azua-Bustos’s team go one step further, proposing a “dark microbiome” which contains potentially relic, extinct Earth species.Īzua-Bustos’s team found sophisticated laboratory techniques could detect a dark microbiome in the Atacama Desert’s Martian-like hyper-arid soil samples. To identify them, we require next-generation sequencing. In my field of extreme microbiology, “microbial dark matter” is when the majority of microscopic organisms in a sample have not been isolated and/or characterised. Traces of life are scarce in the Atacama Desert. This tells us the limits of our detection. Finally, we determine how sensitive tools need to be to detect those biosignatures, on Earth and also Mars. ![]() These include organic molecules like lipids, nucleic acids and proteins. Then we need to develop tools to identify the “biosignatures” for life. Finding evidence of life is challenging, given the harsh conditions and the scarcity of microbial life present.įirst, we must define the biological and physical boundaries of life existing (and being detected) in analogue “extreme” environments. In both of these sites, life exists despite extreme pressures. In my team’s case, our Mars analogue sites are the cold and hyper-arid deserts of the Dry Valleys and Windmill Islands in Antarctica. They were able to detect the mineral components of the samples, but were not always able to detect organic molecules. Armando Azua-Bustos/Centro de Astrobiología, CC BYĪzua-Bustos and colleagues found the rovers’ testbed equipment – tools for analysing samples in the field – had limited ability to detect the traces of life we might expect to find on the red planet. Scientists take samples from the Atacama Desert’s arid soil. The new research, led by Armando Azua-Bustos at the Center for Astrobiology in Madrid, tested the sophisticated instruments currently in use by NASA’s Curiosity and Perseverance rovers – as well as some newer lab equipment planned for future analysis – in the Mars analogue of the Atacama Desert. We call these terrestrial environments “Mars analogue” sites. In astrobiology, we study the diversity of life in sites on Earth with environmental or physical features that resemble regions already described on Mars. New research published today in Nature Communications suggests the rovers’ current equipment might not actually be up to the task of finding evidence of life.Īs an extreme environment microbiologist, the challenges of searching for life where it seems near-impossible are familiar to me. There might be nothing to find – but what if there is, and the rovers just can’t “see” it? ![]() Part of a rover’s mission is to survey the planet for signs of life. Robotic rovers are currently exploring the surface of Mars.
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