There could have been life on Mars

The Curiosity rover has answered a key question about Mars: In the past, the red planet had some of the ingredients needed to support primitive life.

The evidence comes from a chemical analysis by Curiosity, which last month flexed its robotic arm to drill into a fine-grained, veiny rock and test the powder.

Curiosity is the first spacecraft sent to Mars that could collect a sample from deep inside a rock, and scientist said yesterday that they hit the jackpot with that first rock.

“We have found a habitable environment that is so benign and supportive of life that probably if this water was around and you had been on the planet, you would have been able to drink it,” said chief scientist John Grotzinger of the California Institute of Technology.

The analysis showed the rock contained clay minerals that formed in a watery environment. It also had traces of sulphur, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and simple carbon — essential chemical ingredients for life. Curiosity has yet to turn up evidence of complex carbon compounds, considered life’s chemical building blocks. Scientists said a priority is to search for a place where organics might be preserved.