"Recently there was reports of alien cells in the Red Rain in southern Part of India. What is your views on this report?"
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Cerro Negro, Nicaragua: An analog for assessing the potential for life on early Mars (2)
PI: Brian Hynek
Sulfate-rich bedrock on Mars has recently been discovered and studied by both orbiting spacecraft and landers. In most cases, these minerals probably occur from acid-sulfate weathering of igneous rocks and this was likely an important process for the first billion years of Mars’ history. The origin of life on Earth may have occurred in iron-sulfur hydrothermal settings and it is conceivable that Mars had a similar history since there was abundant heat and water in the first billion years of the planet’s existence. Acid-sulfate weathering often dominates the geochemistry of these settings on Earth and assessing the biological potential of such environments is paramount in assessing the potential habitability of early Mars.
A wonderful terrestrial analog for acid-sulfate weathering of Mars-like basalts exists at Cerro Negro, Nicaragua. Here, a similar basaltic chemistry to that of Mars is being chemically altered in a solfatara-like setting. We will use this analog to better understand the astrobiologic potential of Mars in these types of geochemical environments, which may have been dominate in the Red Planet’s early history. Specifically, we have several scientific objectives: (1) assess the microbiological community at the Mars analog site of Cerro Negro, both in terms of population and metabolic functions, (2) culture novel organisms from Cerro Negro and test the extremes under which they can survive, and (3) couple these results with theoretical geochemical modeling to assess geochemical pathways and energy available for utilization by microorganisms.
A reconnaissance field excursion and preliminary laboratory work on Cerro Negro samples is presently being conducted. Initial chemical and mineralogical analyses are providing insights into the geochemical weathering of Mars-like basalts (pathways and rates) under acid-sulfate conditions. Further, we are beginning to assess the microbial population that is exploiting chemical disequilibrium in this harsh environment.
We wish to significantly expand on our current work to assess the astrobiologic potential of these types of environments on early Mars. All of the proposed research is directly relevant to the NASA Exobiology Program’s chief goal of “understand the origin and early evolution of life, the potential of life to adapt to different environments, and the implications for life elsewhere.”
