The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) announced Sept. 10, that in July 2024, while exploring the Bright Angel formation located on the southern edges of Neretva Vallis — an ancient river valley on the eastern edge of Mars’ Jezero Crater — the Perseverance rover came upon a rock named Cheyava Falls. After observing strange leopard-spot patterns on the formation, the rover took a sample called Sapphire Canyon.
Sapphire Canyon is an important discovery we’ve made on Mars. On its surface are deposits of organic compounds, iron-phosphate and iron-sulfide, which could indicate post-depositional redox reactions as a result of organic matter. This means that the chemical we found in Sapphire Canyon could have formed when organic matter reacted with elements in the atmosphere at the time.
It’s important to note this is a theory: the compounds may have been formed another way, but this could be a sign of ancient microbial life. Additionally, even if this is ancient microbial life, it does not mean that we have found actual, active life on Mars. However, with the large amounts of liquid subsurface on Mars, it is not a stretch that if microbial life once existed, it might still.
There are two ways life could have shown up on Mars: either an asteroid hit one of the planets and propelled genetic material to the other planet, or life evolved independently on Mars. Both of these theories would further our understanding of science: if the genetic material is the same as early Earth life, because of the lack of atmosphere, early samples would still be untouched, allowing us to learn a lot more about our genetic history. If life on Mars evolved independently, then life is much more common than we thought. For it to have evolved independently on two neighboring planets, it must be extremely common.
Either way, the implication that we are not alone is both terrifying and exciting. We won’t know for sure until more analysis is conducted back on Earth, and sample-return missions have been delayed due to budget cuts, but this is a discovery worth monitoring closely.
