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"Speculation is that already methane is a rather strong indicator life is probably present today on Mars. Just simply based on methane. ...Formaldehyde is destroyed in the Martian atmosphere within 7.5 hours. There is no way that formaldehyde can exist and remain for a long time in the Martian atmosphere. If (formaldehyde) confirmed, possibly life on Mars today, yes." - Vittorio Formisano, Ph.D., Physicist
May 6, 2004 Rome, Italy - Back on March 31, 2004, I reported at Earthfiles.com that methane measurements in the Martian atmosphere are being analyzed by Physicist Vittorio Formisano, Ph.D., Principal Investigator of the Planetary Fourier Spectrometer (PFS) which he built and is mounted on the European Space Agency's (ESA) Mars Express Orbiter to detect methane. Dr. Formisano is based at the Institute of Physics and Interplanetary Science in Rome, Italy, and has been commuting to ESA offices in Darmstadt, Germany to gather more data from the Planetary Fourier Spectrometer in hopes that he will be able to confirm the location of one or more sources of the Martian methane. In March, he hoped he would be able to make a definitive statement at the European Geophysical Union (EGU) conference on April 26, 2004, in Nice, France.
At the EGU meeting, physicist, V. A. Krasnopolsky, formerly from Russia and now working for NASA/Goddard in Greenbelt, Maryland, presented a paper entitled, "Detection of methane in the Martian atmosphere: Evidence for life." Dr. Krasnopolsky has access only to ground-based telescopes on Earth to look for methane, not the highly sensitive PFS that Dr. Formisano is monitoring. However, Dr. Krasnopolsky hypothesized that the amount of methane in the Martian atmosphere indicates continual replenishment from a source that he thinks is more likely to be biological life than periodic volcanic outgassing or meteorite impacts.
Dr. Formisano tends to agree, but he is holding off his announcement, pending more data from his search for other molecules of life such as benzene and formaldehyde. He hinted to me this week that such molecules have already been detected and the presence of formaldehyde alone in the Martian atmosphere would mean biological processes at work.
Interview:
Vittorio Formisano, Ph.D., Physicist, Principal Investigator of Planetary Fourier Spectrometer (PFS), Methane-detecting spectrometer on Mars Express Orbiter, Institute of Physics and Interplanetary Science, Rome, Italy: "The second half of April, we got very good data, but just recently we got them. With the best of this new data, in the future I will be able to say something about the source of methane.
What I would like to do is first produce a map of methane in the Martian atmosphere and then check if the possible source gives us any hint in terms of volcanic or hydrothermal activity. There is also the search for other molecules that may be indicators of possible biological origin. A few of these are:-benzene-ammonia-formaldehyde.
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