Scientists have a new way to detect signs of life on Mars through an already-existing instrument called a gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer. Derrick Pitts, the chief astronomer and planetarium director at the Franklin Institute, joins with more.

Scientists have found that a device already present on most Mars rovers, the gas chromatograph mass spectrometer, can be used to search for signs of life. This instrument, typically used to analyze the chemical composition of compounds, could be repurposed to look for intact polar lipids, which are key components of cellular membranes and potential indicators of microbial life.

The approach would allow rovers to analyze Martian soil for these chemical signatures and transmit the findings back to Earth. While no evidence of life has been found so far, this method offers a promising way to use existing technology to enhance the search for life on Mars.

Scientists find way to use old tool to detect signs of life on Mars

Have you ever wondered if there is life on Mars? Well, there may be a simple way to find out. New research out this morning reveal that there is already existing technology that can be used to detect signs of life. I want to bring in Chief Astronomer, Derek Pitts. He is the Planetarium Director at the Franklin Institute. Good to see you, Derek. Good morning, Vlad. So can you explain what this existing instrument is and what does it do? Sure, yeah, the instrument that is being talked about is what's called the gas chromatograph mass spectrometer. And what this device is used for is for figuring out what are the basic chemical elements that make up compounds that are found in any location. So if you have some sort of a chemical compound and you want to know what the basic building blocks are, you run it through a gas chromatograph and use a mass spectrometer, and you can separate out what all the basic elements are, and then you'll know what that complex compound was made of. So if scientists are actually able to detect life on Mars, what would that mean? How would it impact future missions in space? And when we say life, I mean, I think people have perhaps different ideas of what that could potentially mean. I mean, are we just talking about any type of carbon-based life form? Oh, well, when you talk about looking for life elsewhere in the universe, in the galaxy, in our solar system, we're first looking for just the basic signs of life. We're looking to see if there's any metabolism of any kind going on with certain chemical compounds and other molecular structures so that we can identify these processes that we associate with life. So we're looking for really small objects. We're looking for microbes. We're looking for single-celled rather than the very elaborate multicellular creatures that we typically find in the science fiction movies. We're starting with the basic stuff first. We haven't found any of that anywhere yet, but this particular new process has some promise for reusing equipment that's found on rovers on Mars to help us identify whether or not there's anything on the planet alive right now. And that's the key thing right now. So how would this work in practice? You would send that rover to Mars, and then could that rover then transmit the data back here to planet Earth, or would we have to wait for it to make a return voyage? Well, here's the cool thing about it. The device that's used to make this analysis, Vlad, they're found on almost every rover on Mars now. And what the scientists in the UK are talking about doing is repurposing that device to look for a very specific kind of chemical signature, and that's the signature of something called intact polar lipids. Intact polar lipids are the main building blocks of cellular membranes, and they contain all kinds of additional information about the microbes in which they're found. So we can use rovers already on the surface of Mars to analyze particular locations that we suspect might be places where life at one time existed or could still exist, and see if we can see these intact polar lipids. If we can identify them using the gas chromatograph and the mass spectrometer, then we have a signal that would, of course, be returned to Earth that tells us that there's something interesting going on there. But I have to emphasize, we haven't found anything like that yet, only locations that look like they are the kinds of places where life might have developed in the past. We see nothing there yet. Very fascinating. Derek Pitts, always good to have you, my friend. Thank you very much.

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