Martian chemistry was friendlier to life

• Autores: Lisa Grossman, Richard Webb
• Localización: New scientist, ISSN 0262-4079, Nº. 2933, 2013, pág. 14
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Two new insights support the age-old idea--known as panspermia--that life rode to Earth on meteorites, although the two don't play nicely together. The first says that the chemistry of early Mars was more favorable than that on Earth for dissolving phosphates, which form the backbone of DNA and its probable precursor RNA. But it requires the Red Planet to have flowed with liquid water. The second says Mars was the better chemical cradle for RNA, but needs a planet that was, at least in part, dry as a desert.