Production and Detection of Organic Compounds on Mars

  • Kensei Kobayashi
  • Takeo Kaneko
  • Yukishige Kawasaki
  • Takeshi Saito
Conference paper

Abstract

In Viking mission in 1976, no organisms nor organic compounds were detected in Mars surface regolith (Soffen, 1976). On the other hand, McKay et al. (1996) detected polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in Martian meteorite ALH 84001 by two-step laser mass spectrometry (L2MS). From the presence of PAHs in it, together with other observations, they concluded that it was plausible that there were past life of Mars. Since life on Mars is still controversial, we need further analyses of Martian samples in order to obtain solid evidences for organisms or bioorganic compounds on Mars.

Keywords

Acetoxymethyl Ester Past Life Fluorescent Reagent Mars Mission Mars Environment 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 1998

Authors and Affiliations

  • Kensei Kobayashi
    • 1
  • Takeo Kaneko
    • 1
  • Yukishige Kawasaki
    • 2
  • Takeshi Saito
    • 3
  1. 1.Department of Chemistry and BiotechnologyYokohama National UniversityHodogaya-ku, YokohamaJapan
  2. 2.Mitsubishi Kasei Institute of Life ScienceMinamiooya, Machida, TokyoJapan
  3. 3.Institute for Cosmic Ray ResearchUniversity of TokyoMidoricho, Tanashi, TokyoJapan

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