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Mushrooms on Mars

Skeptic Ginger said:
I think it's like, wouldn't that be so cool! Then you think it would be so easy to check and obviously they aren't mushrooms. :) :(
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The article at the link: https://www.researchgate.net/public...of_Growth_and_Behavior_From_Sequential_Images Actually does give some reasons why these may not be purely natural chemical or physical phenomenon. Whether one of the Mars Rovers is close enough to trundle over and take a look is for NASA to decide. ;)

Although similarities in morphology are not proof of life, growth, movement, and changes in shape and location constitute behavior and support the hypothesis there is life on Mars.
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shemp said:
But are they edible or poisonous?
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All things from Mars are bent on destruction of the Earth. They are obviously poisonous.

I was dissing Popular Mechanics for running the story because it was so obviously fake, but I think a better target for the dissing would be Advances in Microbiology. It looks like a legit journal, and they published the original paper.
 
Meadmaker said:
All things from Mars are bent on destruction of the Earth. They are obviously poisonous.

I was dissing Popular Mechanics for running the story because it was so obviously fake, but I think a better target for the dissing would be Advances in Microbiology. It looks like a legit journal, and they published the original paper.
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Regardless, you can download the entire 67 page document from Research Gate (link in Gord's post earlier)

It certainly makes interesting reading, and if it is entirely fake (as in made up from whole cloth) then whoever did it has done a fantastic job. I have read a lot of scientific and engineering papers over the years, and this one looks pretty real.

When you start checking into the background of the primary authors, most seem legit

Ashraf Elewa PhD. Professor in the Department of Geology at Minia University Al Minyā, Egypt

Xinli Wi PhD. Professor at the Key Laboratory of Systematic Mycology and Lichenology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

Olivier Planchon PhD. Research scientist working on Environmental Biogeoscience at the French National Centre for Scientific Research, Paris, France.

This guy seems a bit of an oddball though

Rhawn Gabriel Joseph PhD, has some very strange ideas, including "directed panspermia".... i.e. he thinks aliens seeded the earth with life :eye-poppi
https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Rhawn_Joseph

I don't know what to make of it really. Some of their evidence seems compelling, perhaps not of "mushrooms", but of something odd happening on the surface. Also, some of their interpretations of what they see in the photos appears to suffer from some confirmation bias... mushroom stalks for example. Id like to see the provenance of the photographs they claim have been taken by Opportunity, Curiosity and HiRise.

Of course, things growing and changing with seasons doesn't necessarily mean life... crystals for example are entirely mineral in nature and their growth is known to be seasonally affected. Could fungi grow in perchlorate-rich soils? It doesn't seem likely, and I don't know enough about the subject to offer a firm opinion.
 
smartcooky said:
Regardless, you can download the entire 67 page document from Research Gate (link in Gord's post earlier)

It certainly makes interesting reading, and if it is entirely fake (as in made up from whole cloth) then whoever did it has done a fantastic job. I have read a lot of scientific and engineering papers over the years, and this one looks pretty real.

When you start checking into the background of the primary authors, most seem legit

Ashraf Elewa PhD. Professor in the Department of Geology at Minia University Al Minyā, Egypt

Xinli Wi PhD. Professor at the Key Laboratory of Systematic Mycology and Lichenology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

Olivier Planchon PhD. Research scientist working on Environmental Biogeoscience at the French National Centre for Scientific Research, Paris, France.

This guy seems a bit of an oddball though

Rhawn Gabriel Joseph PhD, has some very strange ideas, including "directed panspermia".... i.e. he thinks aliens seeded the earth with life :eye-poppi
https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Rhawn_Joseph

I don't know what to make of it really. Some of their evidence seems compelling, perhaps not of "mushrooms", but of something odd happening on the surface. Also, some of their interpretations of what they see in the photos appears to suffer from some confirmation bias... mushroom stalks for example. Id like to see the provenance of the photographs they claim have been taken by Opportunity, Curiosity and HiRise.

Of course, things growing and changing with seasons doesn't necessarily mean life... crystals for example are entirely mineral in nature and their growth is known to be seasonally affected. Could fungi grow in perchlorate-rich soils? It doesn't seem likely, and I don't know enough about the subject to offer a firm opinion.
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I wonder if this is a case where peer review has a problem. I'm guessing that all the peers who review that particular journal are microbiologists. I wonder what geologists are saying about the photos.
 
Meadmaker said:
I wonder if this is a case where peer review has a problem. I'm guessing that all the peers who review that particular journal are microbiologists. I wonder what geologists are saying about the photos.
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Well at least one of the authors is geologist.

The thing here is, while it is likely that their conclusions are wrong, its difficult to deny that they have evidence of something going on. These spheres do seemingly appear out of nowhere, and then grow in size - this seems on its face to be observable fact - and reapeatedly so, and for this reason, it should not be dismissed out of hand.

I am reminded of a couple of things the late, great Carl Sagan once said...

We wish to pursue the truth, no matter where it leads. But to find the truth, we need imagination and skepticism both. We will not be afraid to speculate. But we will be careful to distinguish speculation from fact.
From: The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean​

"The scientific way of thinking is at once imaginative and disciplined. This is central to its success. Science invites us to let the facts in, even when they don't conform to our preconceptions. It counsels us to carry alternative hypotheses in our heads and see which best fit the facts. It urges on us a delicate balance between no-holds-barred openness to new ideas, however heretical, and the most rigorous sceptical scrutiny of everything - new ideas and established wisdom."
From: The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark - Science & Hope, p30[/I]​

For mine, these both apply here.
 
smartcooky said:
The thing here is, while it is likely that their conclusions are wrong, its difficult to deny that they have evidence of something going on. These spheres do seemingly appear out of nowhere, and then grow in size - this seems on its face to be observable fact - and reapeatedly so, and for this reason, it should not be dismissed out of hand.
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Fungi have certain requirements for growth, including oxygen, water, a certain temperature range and a substrate with adequate organic material. The claims in the article can - and should - be dismissed out of hand by anybody with the slightest knowledge of biology.
 
smartcooky said:
The thing here is, while it is likely that their conclusions are wrong, its difficult to deny that they have evidence of something going on.
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Is there any overlap between the "their" that came to crackpot conclusion and the "they" that actually accumulated the evidence?
 
GlennB said:
Fungi have certain requirements for growth, including oxygen, water, a certain temperature range and a substrate with adequate organic material. The claims in the article can - and should - be dismissed out of hand by anybody with the slightest knowledge of biology.
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Saccharomyces: Hold my beer.
 
GlennB said:
Fungi have certain requirements for growth, including oxygen, water, a certain temperature range and a substrate with adequate organic material. The claims in the article can - and should - be dismissed out of hand by anybody with the slightest knowledge of biology.
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Firstly, if you read my post properly, instead of cherry-picking the bit you had an issue with, you would see that I agree, it is very to extremely, unlikely to be fungi, or at least fungi as we know it. But it is arrogant in the extreme to think that biological science knows everything there is to know about the biological sciences. There are about 100,000 species of fungi, only about 60,000 have been described, but it is estimated there are another 500,000 to almost 10 million species yet to be discovered or observed.

Secondly, maybe these balls are something that is not fungi, but acts like fungi. It could be some form of life as we don't know it, or more likely, could be some chemical or mineral process going on that we as yet do not understand. Crystal growth was at one time thought to be some kind living process, before it was determined that crystallization is a chemical process.

Thirdly, regardless of whether you think this is life or not, it is still fascinating and worthy of investigation and research. It should not be closed-mindedly dismissed as you advocate. With that sort of "we know what the planets are, your telescope cannot tell us anything new" attitude the Church took with Galileo and science in general in the 16th and 17th centruries, nothing would ever have been discovered.. Dismissive handwaving is not science - it never was and never will be.

Finally, and on the subject of fungi requiring oxygen... not always

https://organismalbio.biosci.gatech.edu/biodiversity/fungi-2/

"Fungi thrive in environments that are moist and slightly acidic, and can grow with or without light and oxygen. Most fungi are obligate aerobes, requiring oxygen to survive, however some species, such as the Chytridiomycota that reside in the rumen of cattle, are obligate anaerobes; for these species, anaerobic respiration is used because oxygen will disrupt their metabolism or kill them"​

But even if they do need oxygen (and I confess this is pure, unadulterated, unevidenced speculation on my part) I would point out that perchlorates which appear to be hugely prevalent in Martian spoil, are comprised of an array of oxygen atoms surrounding a central chlorine atom. If these weird ball things are some form of life that needs oxygen, maybe they have "evolved" a way to extract oxygen from the perchlorates in the soil. Again, just speculating.
 
RecoveringYuppy said:
Could you quote the link you used? I came up with a paper that has some overlap of authors but not the same as yours.


https://www.researchgate.net/public...of_Growth_and_Behavior_From_Sequential_Images
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Its in the link you just posted in on the right hand side (Download full text PDF). I know it takes you to a "Join" page, but it still automatically downloaded for me without having to join. Let me know if it works... if it doesn't I will post a share link to it in my Dropbox.
 
smartcooky said:
Its in the link you just posted in on the right hand side (Download full text PDF). I know it takes you to a "Join" page, but it still automatically downloaded for me without having to join. Let me know if it works... if it doesn't I will post a share link to it in my Dropbox.
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Got it. That works. Same authors, just slightly different presentation of their names and titles.
 
RecoveringYuppy said:
Any idea what the ambient temperature was at any of the sites this claimed fungus was found?
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Nope, It doesn't appear to be in the paper; the only mention of actual temperature figures is 2°C in relation to Martian guysers, but if I were to guess... damned cold.

Here's a nice temperature plot here from Mars Exploration Explorer

https://mars.nasa.gov/mer/spotlight/images/20070612/20070612_Spirit_LFHzczm_plot.jpg

Seems like

Winter: -10 to -20°C to -90°c
Summer: +15 to +30°C to -80°C
 
First let me say I think had these been the kind of fungi we know on Earth then the rovers would have seen that they were squishable. So please don't any naysayers jump down my throat, thank you.

That said, it's worthwhile having some out of the box discussion here.

Science Daily: 'Radiation-eating' Fungi Finding Could Trigger Recalculation Of Earth's Energy Balance And Help Feed Astronauts
Summary:
Scientists have long assumed that fungi exist mainly to decompose matter into chemicals that other organisms can then use. But researchers have now found evidence that fungi possess a previously undiscovered talent with profound implications: The ability to use radioactivity as an energy source for making food and spurring their growth....

"The fungal kingdom comprises more species than any other plant or animal kingdom, so finding that they're making food in addition to breaking it down means that Earth's energetics--in particular, the amount of radiation energy being converted to biological energy--may need to be recalculated," says Dr. Arturo Casadevall, chair of microbiology & immunology at Einstein and senior author of the study, published May 23 in PLoS ONE.
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And let's consider this: NASA Finds Ancient Organic Material, Mysterious Methane on Mars
NASA’s Curiosity rover has found new evidence preserved in rocks on Mars that suggests the planet could have supported ancient life, as well as new evidence in the Martian atmosphere that relates to the search for current life on the Red Planet. While not necessarily evidence of life itself, these findings are a good sign for future missions exploring the planet’s surface and subsurface.

The new findings – “tough” organic molecules in three-billion-year-old sedimentary rocks near the surface, as well as seasonal variations in the levels of methane in the atmosphere – appear in the June 8 edition of the journal Science.
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More NASA Mars reports
The new findings -- “tough” organic molecules in 3-billion-year-old sedimentary rocks near the surface, as well as seasonal variations in the levels of methane in the atmosphere -- appear in the June 8 edition of the journal Science.

Organic molecules contain carbon and hydrogen, and also may include oxygen, nitrogen and other elements. While commonly associated with life, organic molecules also can be created by non-biological processes and are not necessarily indicators of life.
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Now remember, the blueberries were thought to be accretions, weren't they? So you wouldn't expect to see shiny fresh bulby things that grow and subsequently shrink.

I would like to see whatever these images actually look like, outside of the article.


And keep in mind we found bacteria near deep sea vents that used heat and chemicals and not a solar source of life.
 
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