Sanity Watch

NASA preps for groundbreaking news: has Curiosity found life on Mars?

Published on Wed, Nov 21, 2012 by Tibi Puiu

 

 

 

Post filled in: Observations, Space

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NASA officials are flooded with media requests from journalists recently looking to find out exactly what all the fuss is all about. Oh, haven’t you heard? Well I’m getting ahead of myself. Well, apparently scientists onboard the Curiosity rover mission have come across data that’s right “for the history books.” A monumental find, nothing less, nothing more, but until this can be 100% confirmed, the scientists have their hands tied and lips sealed.
All we know for sure so far is that the rover’s Sample Analysis at Mars instrument, or SAM for short, has picked up some incredible measurements. For the past six weeks, the rover has been testing its soil-scooping gear at a site called “Rocknest,” where it analyzed multiple samples.

“We’re getting data from SAM as we sit here and speak, and the data looks really interesting,” John Grotzinger, the principal investigator for the rover mission, says during my visit last week to his office at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. “The science team is busily chewing away on it as it comes down,” says Grotzinger.Read on...