{"id":126260,"date":"2021-08-15T23:52:45","date_gmt":"2021-08-16T06:52:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2021\/08\/martian-crust-could-sustain-life-through-radiation"},"modified":"2021-08-15T23:52:45","modified_gmt":"2021-08-16T06:52:45","slug":"martian-crust-could-sustain-life-through-radiation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2021\/08\/martian-crust-could-sustain-life-through-radiation","title":{"rendered":"Martian Crust Could Sustain Life through Radiation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/martian-crust-could-sustain-life-through-radiation.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Deep below the ground, radioactive elements disintegrate water molecules, producing ingredients that can fuel subterranean life. This process, known as radiolysis, has sustained bacteria in isolated, water-filled cracks and rock pores on Earth for millions to billions of years. Now a study published <a href=\"https:\/\/www.liebertpub.com\/doi\/10.1089\/ast.2020.2386\">in <em>Astrobiology<\/em><\/a> contends that radiolysis could have powered microbial life in the Martian subsurface.<\/p>\n<p>Dust storms, cosmic rays and solar winds ravage the Red Planet\u2019s surface. But belowground, some life might find refuge. \u201cThe environment with the best chance of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article\/ancient-mars-could-have-harbored-life-for-a-long-long-time\/\">habitability on Mars<\/a> is the subsurface,\u201d says Jesse Tarnas, a planetary scientist at NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the new study\u2019s lead author. Examining the Martian underground could help scientists learn whether life could have survived there\u2014and the best subsurface samples available today are Martian meteorites that have crash-landed on Earth.<\/p>\n<p>Tarnas and his colleagues evaluated the grain sizes, mineral makeup and radioactive element abundance in Martian meteorites and estimated the Martian crust\u2019s porosity using satellite and rover data. They plugged these attributes into a computer model that simulated radiolysis to see how efficiently the process would have generated hydrogen gas and sulfates: chemical ingredients that can power the metabolism of underground bacteria. The researchers report that if water was present, radiolysis in the Martian subsurface could have sustained microbial communities for billions of years\u2014and perhaps still could today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Deep below the ground, radioactive elements disintegrate water molecules, producing ingredients that can fuel subterranean life. This process, known as radiolysis, has sustained bacteria in isolated, water-filled cracks and rock pores on Earth for millions to billions of years. Now a study published in Astrobiology contends that radiolysis could have powered microbial life in the [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":649,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,1523,2028],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-126260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chemistry","category-computing","category-satellites"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/649"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126260"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126260\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}