City focus sheds light on Mars

Dr Jon Clarke, president of the Mars Society of Australia and Dom Huriwai, 12, from Whangamarino School looking at a view of Earth from the International Space Station at yesterday's open day. Photo / Stephen Parker

Rotorua could hold the key to understanding life on Mars, according to Nasa.

Nasa (the United States' National Aeronautics and Space Administration) and the national scientific community have teamed up in Rotorua for the first Spaceward Bound, a collaborative education and research programme.

They have been studying the area's more extreme environments to create a framework in which to understand potential life on Mars.

They met yesterday for talks from Nasa Ames Research Center principal scientist Dr Chris McKay, and AUT University's Institute for Applied Ecology director Professor Steve Pointing at Te Takinga Marae in Mourea, where they have been staying for the past week.

A geology stand and a star dome were set up for the public, who were welcome to come and meet the Nasa team and get up close with the rover and drones.

Nasa Ames Research Center planetary scientist Carol Stoker said the project's main objective was to understand the origin of life and life forms in extreme climates, which would help scientists understand life on Mars.

"We are interested in understanding all life at the origin of life. The environment we experience now was not here at the origin of life; there was no oxygen, no plants, no animals, and we have an interest in searching for evidence of life on Mars," she said.

"We formulate our experiment design by what we think we will find.

"We learn that by studying analog sites, and Rotorua is an analog site.

"We are not going to go home with the Holy Grail, but we learnt a lot," she said.

Nasa astrobiologist Sanjoy Som said rocks found in Rotorua's more extreme climates could reveal a lot about what life could be like on Mars.

"Rocks are the history books of the planet.

"In the rocks you find evidence of life. Early earth had nothing to do with life as we find it now, and if you can characterise early earth you can characterise other planets," he said.

Professor Pointing said Spaceward Bound would be presenting new curriculum material for NCEA curriculum developers including structured activities, following insights gained from this week's project.