NASA surprised everyone by announcing a historic discovery on the Red Planet. The Perseverance rover detected never-before-seen formations that could be the clearest evidence yet of microbial life on Mars.
According to the space agency, the discovery raises expectations like never before that Mars once had conditions suitable for living organisms in the past.
The Perseverance rover's discovery
Since 2021, the Perseverance rover has been exploring Jezero Crater in search of traces of life. In its latest mission, the PIXL instrument detected so-called "black halos" in certain Martian rocks.
What stands out is that they contain iron and phosphate, two basic elements for the development of life on Earth. This is the first time they have been recorded in this context on Mars.
Why it could be microbial life
On our planet, similar formations are produced thanks to microbes that obtain energy from rock. For this reason, experts do not rule out that this could be a biological process.
