While no aliens have been found on Mars yet, NASA has found evidence that life existed on the red planet billions of years ago, the space agency said on Thursday.
The space agency’s rover Perseverance discovered speckled rocks on Sunday that may offer clues as to whether Mars is or was once a habitable planet.
Nicknamed “Cheyaba Falls” after a waterfall in the Grand Canyon, the “vein-filled” arrowhead-shaped rock appears to contain organic compounds, suggesting that Mars could have supported microbial life when water flowed.
The specimen was found at the northern end of the Neretva Canyon, an ancient river valley roughly a quarter-mile wide that was carved out by water flowing into the Jezero Crater long ago.
“We designed Perseverance’s route to take it to areas that could potentially yield interesting scientific samples,” said Nicola Fox, associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. It said in a statement.
“This trip along the riverbed of the Neretva Valley has been rewarding as we discovered something never seen before, which will provide our scientists with many research opportunities.”
The NASA rover conducted multiple surveys of Cheyaba Falls to search for signs of ancient microbial life, with scientists describing the falls as “the most mysterious, complex and potentially important rock formations ever explored by Perseverance.”
Measuring 3.2 feet long and 2 feet wide, Cheyaba Falls has dozens of leopard-like black and white spots that set it apart from other red-colored rocks on Mars.
According to NASA, the black halo contains iron and phosphate, the same characteristics found in rocks on Earth that harbor fossils of microorganisms on their surfaces.
But it’s too early to tell whether this giant rock holds answers to questions that have long plagued humanity.
Scientists speculated that the black and white rings could simply have been caused by a chemical reaction that had nothing to do with living things.
NASA hopes to bring Cheyaba Falls back to Earth for further study in the next few years, but in the meantime, they’re warning Earthlings not to get too excited about life on Mars.
“Other explanations for the observed features are being considered by the science team, and further work will be needed to determine whether ancient life is a valid explanation,” NASA said.
