A scientist claims NASA found life on Mars 50 years ago but accidentally killed it

After the UFO congressional hearing, we have another episode where another scientist has claimed that alien life exists. Dirk Schulze-Makuch, an astrobiology professor from the Technical University Berlin, claims that 50 years ago, scientists discovered alien life on Mars. However, this life form was unintentionally destroyed by NASA, according to him. 

What the

• So, in the mid-1970s, prior to launching the Curiosity rover, NASA initiated the Viking program, which dispatched two landers to the Martian surface.
• This mission not only provided initial insights into the Martian landscape but also conducted a thorough analysis of the soil to detect potential signs of life.
• The Viking mission was the first mission from the US that made a successful landing on Mars land. 

This Viking Labeled Release experiment initially provided signs of metabolic processes. However, upon a subsequent examination, no signs of organic substances were discovered.

Schulze-Makuch proposed, as part of the initial Viking experiments, water was infused with nutrients and radioactive carbon was introduced to the red Martian soil which could have created unfavourable conditions by overwhelming them for any potential life forms, leading to their eventual demise. And by life forms, he meant potential microbes. 

READ MORE: Mars InSight Lander sends its last message, a touching tribute to the Opportunity Rover

'Confusing results'

In an op-ed for BigThink, Schulze-Makuch described the outcomes as 'puzzling'.

• He revealed that while one of the tests yielded a positive result, indicating signs of life, another test showed no evidence of gas exchange.
• He said the release of these excessive nutrients could be the cause of such potentially confusing results.

Nonetheless, trace quantities of chlorinated organics were detected. 

He added, "Perhaps the putative Martian microbes collected for the labelled release experiments couldn’t deal with that amount of water and died off after a while... It would be as if an alien spaceship were to find you wandering half-dead in the desert, and your would-be saviours decide, 'Humans need water. Let’s put the human in the middle of the ocean to save it!' That wouldn’t work either."

The Viking mission 

The Viking mission, involving two landers named Viking 1 and Viking 2, landed on July 20, 1976, and September 3, 1976 respectively.

Both were equipped with an array of instruments, including a gas chromatograph/mass spectrometer, X-ray fluorescence spectrometer, seismometer, meteorology instrument, and stereo colour cameras.

READ MORE: NASA is training humans for a life on Mars