Using the SHERLOC instrument mounted on the rover’s robotic arm, the Perseverance team made hundreds of organic detections across several rocks in the Bright Angel outcrop, a light-toned formation in Neretva Vallis, the ancient river channel that once fed Jezero’s paleolake.
The detected material consists of macromolecular carbon (MMC), large tangled networks of carbon atoms commonly found in rocks on Earth and meteorites and can arise from biotic or abiotic sources.
Because of its durability, the MMC can survive harsh environmental conditions that would destroy simpler organic molecules.
“The Martian surface environment includes radiation and chemical oxidants that are destructive to organics, and terrestrial laboratory simulations have shown that the survival time of organics in Martian-like conditions — especially at or near the surface — depends on factors such as the type of organic molecule and the surrounding minerals,” said Dr. Ashley Murphy, a postdoctoral researcher at the Planetary Science Institute.
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