Scientist : NASA found life on Mars - and killed it

[Don_1967]

Two NASA space probes that visited Mars 30 years ago may have found alien microbes on the Red Planet and inadvertently killed them, a scientist is theorizing.
Full Story :http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/01/07/mars.life.ap/index.html

[eppur_se_muova]

1. Hydrogen peroxide decomposes in the presence of iron ions ...

and the whole surface of the planet seems to be covered with iron oxides and other iron minerals.

It only takes a catalytic amount of iron, so I doubt that H₂O₂ could accumulate very readily.

It's not impossible, but sure seems implausible to me.

on edit: prettified subscripts. :)

[Redstone]

2. Well, this is just stupid. Any other crackpot theories, wholly unsupported by ANY evidence,

that CNN wants to publish?

What, was it a slow news day?

Redstone

[walldude]

4. My thoughts exactly.. might as well report that Bush's new

Iraq plan is going to work. It's a theory after all...

[Redstone]

6. Well, yeah. He could have just as easily said: "You know, there COULD have been life on Mars that

was hideously allergic to aluminum, so when the feet of the landers touched the surface, it COULD have killed them all."

How the hell do these people manage to get publicity like this?

Redstone

[JHB]

3. Actually, two of the three Viking experiments came up positive...

..., meaning they indicated possible life. It was the one that made the fewest assumptions of life being earthlike that came in negative, and they eventually found a soil chemistry that would produce the false positives.

So I have no idea where this guy is coming from, though that may be more an indication of CNN's inability to report on science than on what the researcher actually claims.

[Generic Brad]

5. They couldn't have killed all of it

I'm pretty certain that if NASA found evidence of microbial life on Mars and accidentally destroyed it that there is still plenty left up there.

[beth9999]

7. Figures... the Repugs aren't happy enough...

...destroying life here on Earth, now they have to destroy it in space too.