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Mars news: Long-chain hydrocarbons found in ancient lakebed stone.
via Courthouse News Service:
Long carbon chains found on Mars hint at ancient habitabilityScientists have discovered the longest organic molecules ever found on Mars — carbon chains up to 12 atoms long — preserved in 3.7-billion-year-old rock inside an ancient lakebed. ...
While the exact origin of the molecules is still unclear, their structure suggests they could be degraded versions of long-chain carboxylic acids — also known as fatty acids — that form the building blocks of life on Earth. These kinds of acids can be made through both biological and chemical processes.
Caroline Freissinet, a researcher with the LATMOS Atmospheres and Space Observations Laboratory in France, said that while the molecules themselves don’t confirm past life on Mars, their presence in a former lakebed shows the planet once had the right conditions for life to exist. ...
Original article:
Long-chain alkanes preserved in a Martian mudstone (paywalled). Here's the abstract:
Organic molecules preserved in ancient Martian rocks provide a critical record of the past habitability of Mars and could be chemical biosignatures. Experiments conducted by the Sample Analysis at Mars instrument onboard the Curiosity rover have previously reported several classes of indigenous chlorinated and sulfur-containing organic compounds in Gale crater sedimentary rocks, with chemical structures of up to six carbons. Here, we report the detection of decane (C₁₀H₂₂), undecane (C₁₁H₂₄), and dodecane (C₁₂H₂₆) at the tens of pmol level, released from the Cumberland drilled mudstone sample, using a modified SAM analytical procedure optimized for the detection of larger organic molecules. Laboratory experiments support the hypothesis that the alkanes detected were originally preserved in the mudstone as long-chain carboxylic acids. The origin of these molecules remains uncertain, as they could be derived from either abiotic or biological sources.
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