NASA's Curiosity rover detects high methane gas levels, hinting at life on Mars

There are two options for the cause of the gas: Microbes or the interaction between water and rocks. NASA’s Curiosity rover on Mars has made yet another discovery about the Red Planet – it has methane gas on it. Microbial life is an important source of methane on Earth, it comes from anaerobic microbes called methanogens that are also present in the guts of cows, but also found in the decay of plant matter and other biological processes in places like wetlands. SAM Principal Investigator Paul Mahaffy of NASA’s Goddard Spaceflight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland said: “With our current measurements, we have no way of telling if the methane source is biology or geology, or even ancient or modern.” There is no way to know where the methane is actually coming from either because Curiosity has no instrument that can find that out. In a press release, NASA said, “Curiosity’s scientists need time to analyse these clues and conduct many more methane observations.” They are also looking into collaborating with the European Space Agency’s Trace Gas Orbiter that has been in orbit since 2016 but has not detected any sign of methane.