Curiosity rover finds largest carbon chains on Mars from 3.7-billion-year-old rock

By Ben Turner, Jess Thomson
published 14 hours ago

NASA's Curiosity Rover has discovered long carbon chains on Mars. On Earth, molecules like these are overwhelmingly produced by biological processes.


The longest molecules ever found on Mars have been unearthed by NASA's Curiosity rover, and they could mean the planet is strewn with evidence for ancient life.

Molecule chains containing up to twelve carbon atoms linked together were detected in a 3.7 billion-year-old rock sample collected from a dried-up Martian lakebed named Yellowknife Bay, according to a study published March 24 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

These long carbon chains are thought to have originated from molecules called fatty acids, which, on Earth, are produced by biological activity. While fatty acids can form without biological input, which may be the case on Mars, their existence on the Red Planet means that signs of life may be lurking within its soil.

"The fact that fragile linear molecules are still present at Mars' surface 3.7 billion years after their formation allows us to make a new statement: If life ever appeared on Mars billions of years ago, at the time life appeared on the Earth, chemical traces of this ancient life could still be present today for us to detect," study co-author Caroline Freissinet, an analytical chemist at the French National Centre for Scientific Research in the Laboratory for Atmospheres and Space Observations, told Live Science.

More:
https://www.livescience.com/space/mars/curiosity-rover-finds-largest-carbon-chains-on-mars-from-3-7-billion-year-old-rock