In a paper in this week’s Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers report that Curiosity has found oxidized nitrogen-bearing compounds in samples collected from three sites in Gale Crater, the 96-mile-wide basin the rover has been exploring since August 2012.
“The samples contained more nitrogen than could be accounted for from known terrestrial instrument sources, with the bulk of the nitrogen in the form of nitric oxide,” scientists wrote in a summary of their research.
The team theorizes that nitric oxide may have been released from decomposing nitrates as the sample was heated for analysis.
“Terrestrial life requires a fixed form of nitrogen for synthesis of crucial biomolecules, and the discovery of indigenous fixed nitrogen in Martian rocks and sediments has implications for the past habitability potential of Mars,” the researchers noted.
Nitrogen is essential for all known forms of life, since it is used in the building blocks of larger molecules like DNA and RNA, which encode the genetic instructions for life, and proteins, which are used to build structures like hair and nails, and to speed up or regulate chemical reactions, NASA said in a related press release about the research.
“There is no evidence to suggest that the fixed nitrogen molecules found by the team were created by life,” NASA added.
“The surface of Mars is inhospitable for known forms of life. Instead, the team thinks the nitrates are ancient, and likely came from non-biological processes like meteorite impacts and lightning in Mars’ distant past,” NASA said.
Read more at Discovery News
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