Alh84001 controversy

The Alan Hills meteorite is a part of history to Mars aficionados. It came from Mars and meteorite hunters discovered in Antarctica in The meteorite made headlines in when a team of researchers said they found evidence of life in it. Twelve years after its discovery, a team of scientists claimed to find evidence of microscopic bacterial fossils in the meteorite.

Meteorite alh84001 life on mars

Although inorganic formation is possible, the formation of the globules by biogenic processes could explain many of the observed features, including the PAHs polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. The PAHs, the carbonate globules, and their associated secondary mineral phases and textures could thus be fossil remains of a past martian biota.

That was controversial, and it was huge news. So huge that then-President Bill Clinton saw fit to make a speech about it. It must be confirmed by other scientists. There are a lot of false positives when it comes to fossilized evidence of microscopic life. Purely geological structures can mimic organic structures. But now we know that a host of geological processes can produce organic-looking structures.

Anybody who saw these images could easily assume that they were organic. And the idea that they could be biological had to be examined. In a new study, a team of researchers took a deeper look into the microscopic organic-looking structures in ALH