NASA Curiosity: traces of methane on Mars, will it be life?

The U.S. agency has announced with a brief announcement on the JPL website that NASA Curiosity has discovered traces of methane on Mars with levels that have never been seen before. Obviously, the mind instantly runs to the possibility that the microorganisms current on the Red Planet produced methane, opening up situations that would be revolutionary.

However, while not excluding this possibility, the team that follows the NASA Curiosity mission was careful in wanting to verify this option for several reasons. In reality, the interaction between certain kinds of rocks and water and not necessarily biological organisms could also generate methane. To make the situation more complicated, it should be pointed out that the rover has tools to detect methane, but not to understand whether it is of biological origin.

Detection using the laser spectrometer (SAM) found 21 ppbv (an acronym of parts per billion units in volume), but very little to think of a massive phenomenon, according to reports.

Another important detail is that it is not clear whether methane originated near the rover in the Gale crater or whether atmospheric currents and winds from other parts of Mars brought it there.

It should also be noted that in the past, NASA Curiosity had already detected methane in the Martian atmosphere, also demonstrating a seasonal trend in the amounts identified, and therefore did not find methane but its amount to surprise researchers. Now the team will attempt to comprehend whether it's a transient peak or whether the methane is continuous (and it's the first time).

Researchers will work with other organizations like ESA to exploit other tools like the Trace Gas Orbiter (which did not detect methane instead). The union of an tool on the surface and one in orbit could enable the source of methane to be located as a starting point for new missions.