• Question: is there life on mars?

    Asked by sussim24 to Alexandra, Dean, Jess, Luisa, Sian on 21 Jun 2010 in Categories: . This question was also asked by aimeeculley.
    • Photo: Luisa Ostertag

      Luisa Ostertag answered on 21 Jun 2010:

      We don’t know yet. Possibly?!

    • Photo: Sian Foch-Gatrell

      Sian Foch-Gatrell answered on 21 Jun 2010:

      There was. Not so sure about now.

    • Photo: Dean Whittaker

      Dean Whittaker answered on 21 Jun 2010:

      Life produces lots of methane. They have found methane coming from caves on mars. We also know there is water on mars. So under the plannet there may be some form of life living in liquid water producing this methane. We also think there could be life on one of the moons of Urinus (I think, or maybe it’s Jupiter, I don’t remember)…

      I went to a talk on the mars rovers – they’re fantastic little things, to clean the solar panels, NASA drive them into little tornadoes that are on mars, this blasts off all the dust so the panels start working better again. They found this out by mistake and extended the life of the rovers by 20 times what they expected!

    • Photo: Jessica Housden

      Jessica Housden answered on 21 Jun 2010:

      There is almost certainly not life like animals and trees on Mars. However, it is thought that there once was running water, and that some water may be still underneath the surface (we know that there isn’t any on the surface).
      Water is the key; it is (as far as we know) required for life. So scientists are hoping that on Mars, even if there is no water any more, when there was life like bacteria may have been present. So, that is what they are looking for; maybe fossilised remains of bacteria or other small microscopic life forms.

      To do that, we need to dig below the surface as that is where we stand the best chance of finding anything. Where I work there is team of people developing a Mars Rover. This is an ESA mission and will take the first drill to Mars. It will be launched in 2018, so fingers crossed; it might find something very exciting! It’s a really cool mission – we have three prototypes called Bridget, Bruno and Bradley and a very large sandpit for them to play in (for our testing). I’m going to be with Bruno at the Farnborough Air show – if anyone’s around come and say hi!

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