Article Posted on : - Mar 14, 2013

Rocks seen by NASA's Opportunity rover and Curiosity rover at two different parts of Mars. Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell/MSSS.

PASADENA, CALIFORNIA (BNS): An analysis of a rock sample collected by Curiosity rover has shown that ancient Mars could have supported living microbes, NASA said.

Scientists identified sulfur, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and carbon -- some of the key chemical ingredients for life -- in the powder Curiosity drilled out of a sedimentary rock near an ancient stream bed in Gale Crater on the Red Planet in February.

Data collected by the rover's Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) and Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) instruments indicate, the Yellowknife Bay area, the rover is exploring was the end of an ancient river system or an intermittently wet lake bed that could have provided chemical energy and other favourable conditions for microbes.

The rock is made up of a fine-grained mudstone containing clay minerals, sulfate minerals and other chemicals. This ancient wet environment, unlike some others on Mars, was not harshly oxidizing, acidic or extremely salty, they said.

Curiosity's drill collected the sample at a site just a few hundred yards away from where the rover earlier found an ancient streambed in September 2012.

According to David Blake, principal investigator for the CheMin instrument, clay minerals make up at least 20 percent of the composition of this sample.

"The range of chemical ingredients we have identified in the sample is impressive, and it suggests pairings such as sulfates and sulfides that indicate a possible chemical energy source for micro-organisms," Paul Mahaffy, principal investigator of the SAM suite of instruments, was quoted as saying.

Scientists plan to work with Curiosity in the 'Yellowknife Bay' area for many more weeks before beginning a long drive to Gale Crater's central mound, Mount Sharp.

Investigating the stack of layers exposed on Mount Sharp, where clay minerals and sulfate minerals have been identified from orbit, may add information about the duration and diversity of habitable conditions, NASA said.

Curiosity, carrying 10 science instruments, landed seven months ago to begin its two-year prime mission. NASA's Mars Science Laboratory Project has been using Curiosity to investigate whether an area within Mars' Gale Crater ever has offered an environment favourable for microbial life.