Sunday, January 14, 2007

Microbe experiment suggests we could all be Martians | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited

Ian Sample, science correspondent
Saturday January 13, 2007
The Guardian

Life on Earth may have announced its arrival billions of years ago with a whistle and a thump, according to planetary scientists.

Experiments by an international team of researchers back a controversial theory that life flourished on Earth after primitive organisms arrived aboard a meteorite, itself gouged from Mars by a giant impact.

The theory supposes that life was able to gain a tentative foothold on the red planet as it cooled down and became more hospitable several billion years ago. At the time, the planet's surface was regularly bombarded with rocky detritus from the asteroid belt, knocking clumps of rock and the microbes living on them into space, where the gravity of the sun brought them hurtling towards Earth.

Article continues

Comments: Post a Comment

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]





<< Home

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?

Subscribe to Posts [Atom]