A rock caught the eyes of the NASA Curiosity Rover team, one which shows an unusual abundance of materials that might hold fossilized organics. The rock, called the Elk bedrock, has an abundance of silicon, oxygen, and hydrogen. In particular, the first two exist as the compound silica, which could preserve evidence of ancient organics on Mars.

The Curiosity rover is currently near Mount Sharp in what's believed to be an ancient lakebed, in particular because of the meeting of limestone and mudstone. If there once was life on Mars, the lakebed would be a great place to look. And if the Elk bedrock contains ancient organics, it'd be a great sample to look at.

The rover is unable to look for signs of life, but rather has to take a more circuitous route by building incremental evidence to suggest it, such as by testing rock composition for signs of ancient water. Missions like the European Space Agency's ExoMars probe will be more adept at searching for biosignatures, as will NASA's Curiosity follow-up, the Mars 2020 Rover.

Source: Discovery

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