Abstract
By analogy with Earth, methane in the Martian atmosphere is a potential signature of ongoing or past biological activity. During the past decade, Earth-based telescopic observations reported “plumes” of methane of tens of parts per billion by volume (ppbv), and those from Mars orbit showed localized patches, prompting speculation of sources from subsurface bacteria or nonbiological sources. From in situ measurements made with the Tunable Laser Spectrometer (TLS) on Curiosity using a distinctive spectral pattern specific to methane, we report no detection of atmospheric methane with a measured value of 0.18 ± 0.67 ppbv corresponding to an upper limit of only 1.3 ppbv (95% confidence level), which reduces the probability of current methanogenic microbial activity on Mars and limits the recent contribution from extraplanetary and geologic sources.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 355-357 |
| Number of pages | 3 |
| Journal | Science |
| Volume | 342 |
| Issue number | 6156 |
| Early online date | 19 Sept 2013 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 18 Oct 2013 |
Bibliographical note
Acknowledgments: The research described here was carried out in part at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Data described in the paper are further described in the supplementary materials and have been submitted to NASA’s Planetary Data System under an arrangement with the Mars ScienceLaboratory project.