Has NASA killed life on Mars?

Two space probes of the US Aeronautics Agency (NASA) landed on Mars 30 years ago that probably detected strange bacteria on the red planet and accidentally destroyed them. This is the hypothesis given by geology professor Dirk Schulze-Makuch at the University of Washington (USA) at the Conference of the American Astronomical Society last week. He said that two Viking space probes were looking for the wrong form of life, so they didn't realize it.

In the 1970s, the Viking found no signs of life, but it was programmed to search for life like Earth, whereby saltwater is the liquid inside living cells. Under Mars's cold dry conditions, life can evolve with internal fluids mainly composed of water mixtures and hydrogen peroxide.

This is because the hydrogen peroxide mixture is in liquid state when the temperature is very low (-20 ^° C) and does not destroy the cell when it freezes. This mixture can absorb water vapor from the air. The Viking ship's experiments did not pay attention to the life based on hydrogen peroxide and could in fact kill life by experimenting with flooding and heating bacteria.

Mars surface (Photo: Reuters)

Over the past few years, scientists have discovered life on Earth in very harsh conditions such as Spain's acid-contaminated rivers and frozen Antarctic lakes. Based on a more comprehensive view of where life can be ' rooted ', Dirk's hypothesis could alert NASA to search for another form of life on Mars when it plans to launch new ships on the planet. Red at the end of the year.

N.MINH