NASA'S PERSEVERANCE ROVER FINDS POSSIBLE SIGNS OF ANCIENT RED PLANET LIFE

Further analysis is needed, but a rock contains potential evidence that life once existed on Mars in the distant past

- Sharmila Kuthunur

NASA's Perseverance rover may have found signs of ancient life in a rock on Mars. The mission team's scientists are ecstatic, but remain cautious, as further analysis is needed to confirm the discovery. The rover has come across an intriguing, arrowhead-shaped rock that hosts chemical signatures and structures that could have been formed by microbial life billions of years ago, when Mars was significantly wetter than it is today. Inside the rock, which scientists have nicknamed Cheyava Falls, Perseverance's instruments detected organic compounds, which are precursors to the chemistry of life as we know it. Wisping through the length of the rock are veins of calcium sulphate, mineral deposits that suggest water - also essential for life once ran through the rock.