This news release from NASA headquarters may slow down the current life on Mars story:
News reports on February 16, 2005, that NASA scientists from Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif., have found strong evidence that life may exist on Mars are incorrect.
NASA does not have any observational data from any current Mars missions that supports this claim. The work by the scientists mentioned in the reports cannot be used to directly infer anything about life on Mars, but may help formulate the strategy for how to search for martian life. Their research concerns extreme environments on Earth as analogs of possible environments on Mars. No research paper has been submitted by them to any scientific journal asserting martian life.
Centauri Dreams note: The NASA press release discusses the work of Carol Stoker and Larry Lemke at Ames Research Center, published as an exclusive by Space.com and described in the February 17 entry below. Today’s entry describing Vittorio Formisano’s work on formaldehyde in the Martian atmosphere has not been addressed by NASA.
