Martian minerals dissolved in groundwater are much more likely to yield a key building block for life – phosphate – than dissolved minerals on Earth. At least, that’s the finding of a lab-based physical simulation designed to work out the habitability of ancient environments on the Red Planet.
The news comes just a few days after a prominent chemist aired his theory that only on Mars were the right chemical elements – specifically boron, molybdenum and oxygen – present at the right time to produce RNA molecules. RNA is widely thought to be the precursor to DNA and therefore to life as we know it.
Read the full, original story here: “Martian soup may have been tasty to early life”
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