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What Do Scientists Hope To Learn With NASA's Mars Perseverance Rover?
On THURSDAY, APRIL 29, 2021 the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee held a special conference on cable television C-SPAN.
This video plainly describes NASA's role using the Perseverance rover in the first part of their direct Earth return Mars Sample Return plans.
No discussions about possible biohazards from Mars are discussed. The return of pathogenic or toxic samples of any celestial body to Earth is
a direct violation of international law as outlined in Article nine of the UN Outer Space Treaty. As the conference continues, at 32 minutes
and seven seconds into the video a map of Mars is shown that depicts the various NASA spacecraft landing sites on Mars but does not show the
only missions to ever have life detection experiments on board - the 1976 Viking Landers. In fact the whole conference avoids discussing the
Viking search for life altogether. Preselected members of the press were allowed to ask questions - none of them which asked important
questions about the data from the Viking Landers indicating that strong evidence for microbial metabolism was found and the possible hazards
of returning Martian soil samples directly to Earth.
OPENING STATEMENTS
Chairman Don Beyer (D-VA) of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics
Chairwoman Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX)
WITNESSES
Dr. Michael A. Meyer, Lead Scientist, Mars Exploration Program, National Aeronautics and Space Administration [Truth in Testimony] Dr. Bethany L. Ehlmann, Professor of Planetary Science and Associate Director of the Keck Institute for Space Studies, California Institute of Technology; President, The Planetary Society; Co-Investigator, Mars 2020 Perseverance mission [Truth in Testimony] Dr. Luther Beegle, Principal Investigator of the Mars Perseverance Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals (SHERLOC) Instrument, Jet Propulsion Laboratory [Truth in Testimony] Dr. Tanja Bosak, Returned Sample Science Co-Lead, Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover; Professor and Lead of the Option in Geology, Geochemistry, and Geobiology, Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology [Truth in Testimony]
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Local scientist has evidence of life on Mars - Barry DiGregorio of Middleport believes that he has discovered
evidence of life on Mars. Barry is an astrobiologist and an honorary research fellow with the University of Buckingham. He studies gases, rocks and
other materials that are indicators of life and in his words "we apply that to what we might find on other planets." Barry's latest discovery, after
studying images sent back from NASA's Curiosity Rover, has been getting world-wide coverage. He believes that he has found trace fossils on Mars-similar
to trace fossils found her on earth and dating back to about 450 million years ago. Trace fossils are tracks or footprints left behind by once living
creatures. Barry says that "what it says is that life rose to the multi-cellular level." He admits that NASA is not so quick to agree that the squiggles
seen in the images are trace fossils adding "NASA is saying they are crystals." Barry DiGregorio will continue to study trace fossils and will be
presenting his hypothesis of trace fossils on Mars in a scientific paper to a conference that will be held in Australia this June.
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How the Viking Mission Found Microbial Life on Mars (Part 1 of 5) - A video of Dr. Gilbert V. Levin discussing the
Labeled Release experiment, from concept, to development, to deployment aboard the two Viking Landers that landed on Mars in 1976, and the LR results.
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