While exploring the dry river delta region on Mars, the Perseverance rover has collected rock samples containing a significant amount of organic material.
Simulation of the Perseverance rover searching for signs of ancient life on Mars. (Image: NASA)
After 18 months of searching for traces of ancient life on the red planet, NASA’s Perseverance rover has collected nearly half of the planned rock samples, some of which contain organic material or carbon-containing molecules that many consider the building blocks of life.
In a statement on September 15, scientist Ken Farley from the Perseverance project at the California Institute of Technology noted that the rocks they are studying in the Jezero crater, which may have been a lake and river delta over 3.5 billion years ago, have the highest concentration of organic material found during the mission.
The rover has been measuring and sampling in an area known as Skinner Ridge, which consists of multiple layers of sedimentary rock, some of which likely originated from hundreds of kilometers away due to water flow billions of years ago.
Perseverance using its robotic arm to examine the Skinner Ridge outcrop. (Image: NASA)
These sedimentary layers contain complex organic molecules known as aromatics, as well as clay and sulfate minerals that could form when water interacts with rock. Although none of the material is definitively a sign of life, their discovery indicates that scientists are searching in the right places.
“This is really important because it shows that the sedimentary rocks here have the potential to preserve high biological characteristics, meaning if there were any biological traces in the vicinity when the rock formed, this is exactly the type of material that would retain what we are looking for when the rock samples are returned to Earth,” said researcher David Shuster from the University of California, Berkeley, during a press conference.
Findings of organic material on Mars have increased as the Perseverance rover explores the Jezero crater. “Organic material is a clue to uncovering potential signs of life on another planet. We are gathering stronger clues as we conduct our campaign,” emphasized scientist Sunanda Sharma at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
However, it is likely that we will not find “definitive signs” of life on Mars until the rock samples collected by Perseverance are brought back to Earth in a mission planned for 2028.
