Mars Mosiac – astrogeology.usgs.gov
If you wish to view the TED Talks video. Click the link below.
http://www.ted.com/talks/nathalie_cabrol_how_mars_might_hold_the_secret_to_the_origin_of_life#t-195720
http://www.ted.com/talks/nathalie_cabrol_how_mars_might_hold_the_secret_to_the_origin_of_life#t-195720
If we are to discover the origin of life on our planet we must look to our neighboring planets that could also support life like Mars. Before we can discover whether there was or is life on Mars we must see what the conditions were like before the Sun bombarded Mars' atmosphere with "solar winds" which caused the "magnetic field" to disappear, leaving the surface unprotected from "cosmic rays"evaporating the Waters of Mars. In order to see The planet before it was damaged by the we must find places on Earth that naturally replicates the conditions that Mars was under.
Andes Mountains: Photo by Cristóbal Hurtado.
Nathalie and her crew traveled to the Andes, which are in practically the same conditions that both Earth and Mars were in "less that a billion years" after they were formed. She used the area's conditions as sort of a "time machine" to see if life was sustainable in such hard conditions. Nathalie found that yes; organisms can live in harsh conditions, but they must adapt in order to survive. In order to protect themselves from the harsh rays they first developed a natural "sunscreen", but this did not completely solve the problem the organisms began to burrow into the ground.
If we are to take anything away from this presentation is that if we are to search for life we have to look in the hard to reach places, and not expect to run into intelligent life, but microbes that could tell us how we got our begining
Andes Mountains: Photo by Cristóbal Hurtado.
Nathalie and her crew traveled to the Andes, which are in practically the same conditions that both Earth and Mars were in "less that a billion years" after they were formed. She used the area's conditions as sort of a "time machine" to see if life was sustainable in such hard conditions. Nathalie found that yes; organisms can live in harsh conditions, but they must adapt in order to survive. In order to protect themselves from the harsh rays they first developed a natural "sunscreen", but this did not completely solve the problem the organisms began to burrow into the ground.
If we are to take anything away from this presentation is that if we are to search for life we have to look in the hard to reach places, and not expect to run into intelligent life, but microbes that could tell us how we got our begining