NEW MARS ROCK COULD SHOW SIGNS OF LIFE

Fri, 1 Nov 1996 01:25:25 -0500
Source: The Associated Press
By ROBERT SEELY .c The Associated Press

LONDON (Oct. 31) - British scientists have found more signs that life may have existed on Mars, saying Thursday that a second meteorite millions of years younger than one studied by NASA has organic material that could be traces of living organisms.

''These findings offer the strongest support yet for the hypothesis that life once existed on the planet,'' astronomer Colin Pillinger said at a news conference.

In August, NASA scientists said they had found microscopic and chemical evidence of life on Mars in meteorite ALH 84001, which dates back about 3.6 billion years.

Pillinger and his colleagues from Britain's The Open University studied pieces of that meteorite, and of another, EETA 79001, which was formed 180 million years ago and blown into space about 600,000 years ago. The meteorites were found in Antarctica in 1979 and 1984.

Pillinger's discoveries have not been reviewed by other scientists.

Doug Blanchard, head of a NASA research group, said although he hadn't seen the full British report, the findings are exciting and support the idea that life might still exist on Mars.

Blanchard, at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, said the fact that the meteorite examined by the London group is much younger than the one NASA scientists looked at - and that both may have evidence of life - suggests that life could have continued on Mars for much longer than previously thought - and perhaps still be there.

The British scientists said their evidence is based on the existence of organic and carbonate matter found in both meteorites.

''Whenever you come across organic matter, it is usually evidence of life,'' Pillinger said. Pillinger said that in 1989, in the magazine Nature, he first presented chemical evidence from meteorite 79001 to suggest that life existed on Mars.

Those results were criticized by other scientists who said the organic matter discovered in the meteorite could have been picked up on the meteorite's trip to Earth.

After the NASA scientists' announcement of their evidence from meteorite AHL 84001, Pillinger re-ran his experiment this month on several samples from both meteorites.

This time, he said, he carried out his experiments on parts of 79001 that had become sealed in a glass-like substance before the meteorite came to Earth, and thus was insulated from the Earth's organic matter.

The most important finding, Pillinger said, is that 79001 contains significant amounts of organic material - up to 1,000 parts per million - which has yet to be identified.

The scientists also found in 84001 tiny amounts of carbonate the composition of which suggests it was formed from methane - a gas often produced by microorganisms.

In addition, the composition was similar to that of organic matter in rocks where the Earth's oldest fossils are found.

The other scientists involved in the project were Ian Wright and Monica Grady. Grady, who is with the Natural History Museum, said a third meteorite from Mars, stored at the museum since 1913, would be made available to researchers.

NASA's Blanchard said the London group's findings in the meteorite ALH 84001 seem to support the interpretation made by NASA's McKay group in August.

''Those carbon isotopes are part of what we have both looked for. They could be good indicators of life.'' The fact that two teams now have found the isotopes ''is very encouraging,'' Blanchard said.

''We are quite pleased that other people are finding evidence.''

Blanchard said he also is more hopeful that life might be found on Mars by the spacecraft being launched toward the Red Planet next year.

''If the objective is to find life when you get to Mars, this an important step in the right direction,'' he said.

Dr. William Schopf, professor of Paleobiology at the University of California, Los Angeles, said the occurrence of organic matter, ''if it is really established to be from Mars, is really interesting and highly significant.''

He had not seen the British study and would not comment on specifics, but said it would be surprising if the biochemistry of Mars and Earth would be similar enough to produce very similar evidence, like the production of methane.

''These things reflect a set of specific biochemical 'tricks' that Earth organisms do,'' he told The Associated Press in a telephone interview.

''Why is it that Martian life does similar tricks to Earth life?'' he asked. ''If life arose independently you wouldn't necessarily expect that Mars life would do what Earth life does.''

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