An international team of researchers found that the Martian meteorite that came to Earth 12 years ago includes a "great diversity" of organic molecules, including one that has never been detected on Mars before. The discoveries might help scientists learn more about Mars' habitability and if it once supported life.
The researchers led by the Technical University of Munich and Helmholtz Munich's Philippe Schmitt-Kopplin and featuring Carnegie's Andrew Steele reported their findings in the study, titled "Complex Carbonaceous Matter in Tissint Martian Meteorites Give Insights Into the Diversity of Organic Geochemistry on Mars," in the journal Science Advances.
Organic Compounds in the Martian Meteorite
On July 18, 2011, the Tissint meteorite exploded in the sky above Tissint, Morocco, scattering bits of the space rock across the surrounding desert. The Martian meteorite is hundreds of millions of years old and was most likely expelled by a catastrophic event before getting trapped in Earth's gravitational field. It is one of just five Martian meteorites that mankind has seen crash into the planet.
Live Science reported that researchers investigated bits of the meteorite and discovered evidence of at least five distinct types of chemical molecules. They said that the study is the most thorough inventory yet created from the diversity of organic molecules found in a Martian meteorite or in a sample recovered and studied by a rover.
Organic compounds are molecules made up of carbon atoms bound to atoms of one or more additional elements, examples include hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and sulfur. Their presence in space rocks might imply the presence of life elsewhere in the solar system because these chemicals are common in all lifeforms on Earth.
However, scientists are unsure if such chemicals represent evidence of life in distant worlds since some organic molecules may be created by non-biological processes.
They found that the Tissint meteorite included organic magnesium compounds that were abundant throughout the space rock and had never been discovered in other Martian samples before.
The team thinks that these chemicals were generated under the high-pressure and high-temperature conditions of the ancient mantle of Mars, implying that they are non-biological and might give information about how the Red Planet's deep interior was formed.
They also discovered aliphatic branched carboxylic acids compounds, which have structures similar to amino acids found in proteins, and aldehydes in which a carbon atom is double bonded, or shares multiple electrons, with an oxygen atom. Also, they found olefins or hydrocarbons with one or more carbon atoms double bonded to each other, and the complex hydrocarbons polyaromatics.
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What the Chemical Composition of Martian Meteorite Taught Scientists
The research revealed data about how processes in Mars' mantle and crust developed, particularly abiotic organics generated by water-rock interactions.
According to Sci-News, the prevalence of organic magnesium compounds offers fresh insights into the high-pressure, high-temperature geochemistry that sculpted the deep Martian subsurface and suggests a link between the planet's carbon cycle and mineral development.
Dr. Andrew Steele, a researcher at the Carnegie Institution for Science, said that understanding the process and sequence of events that shaped the organic matter will reveal new details on the habitability of Mars and potentially the reactions that occurred that led to the formation of life.
Martian rock samples returned by future missions will provide further information about the planet's formation, stability, and dynamics of organic compounds in the Red Planet's environment.
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