Meteorite from Mars ‘holds evidence of life’, researchers claim

A chunk of rock hurled from the surface of ancient Mars to our planet holds what scientists believe might be evidence of life on the Red Planet.

Traces of carbon in the rock seem to indicate the presence of life - but not as we know it on Earth.

The Tissint meteorite fell in the Moroccan desert in July 2011.

The alien rock has fissures which scientists have shown are filled with carbon-containing matter - which could be evidence that life once flourished on the surface of Mars.

‘So far there is no other theory that we find more compelling,’ says Philippe Gillet, director of Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne’s Earth and Planetary Sciences Laboratory.

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Gillet and colleagues from China, Japan and Germany have conducted tests on the Tissint meteorite - and believe that organic matter may have been deposited in the rock by water filled with organic matter, while it still lay on the surface of Mars.

Gillet claims that chemical characteristics of the carbon material shows that i is organic - and that it is not from Earth.

The researchers say that levels of certain radioactive isotopes of carbon are similar to what might expect in a piece of coal from Earth - but from Mars.

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Gillet says, ‘Insisting on certainty is unwise, particularly on such a sensitive topic.’

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‘I’m completely open to the possibility that other studies might contradict our findings. However, our conclusions are such that they will rekindle the debate as to the possible existence of biological activity on Mars – at least in the past.’