NASA’s Curiosity Rover May Have Found Fossils on Mars
For years, theorists have suggested that Mars once contained the necessary requirements to support life. Now, NASA’s Curiosity rover may have finally found indication of this from images showing what appear to be fossilized microbial structures.
Over the past five and a half years, NASA’s Curiosity rover has been mapping and imaging the Martian surface to gain more insight on the dusty planet. In addition to snapping pictures, the nomadic vehicle has been searching for signs of water, while also determining the viability for human colonization.
Scientists know that water once flowed on Mars and have been on a quest to discover whether it still does to this day. Aside from ice caps on the Martian poles, evidence of water in Mars’ past can be seen in dried lake beds, gullies, and what was once a large ocean in the planet’s topography.
In recent images of the Gillespie Lake outcrop, in the Yellowknife Bay area, Curiosity sent back pictures of small stick-like formations in a segment of sedimentary rock. To the untrained eye these formations might not appear to be much, but to a microbiologist who has studied microbially induced sedimentary structures (MISS), the pictures seem to have some profound implications.
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Nora Noffke of Old Dominion University in Virgina meticulously compared the photo to instances of MISS on Earth and published a paper that has intrigued scientists at NASA. Though she’s hesitant to make any definitive claims, her paper provides some of the best evidence to date for indications of past lifeforms.
The stick-shaped markings aren’t actually considered to be fossils of microorganisms themselves, but rather fossils of their imprints.
Some have contested that these tubular markings are more likely crystals, rather than the footprint of microorganisms. In either case, the finding shows that the area once consisted of a body of water that had the elements needed to support life.
NASA is planning on sending another rover to Mars in 2020 that is nearly identical to Curiosity, with the goal of strictly searching for signs of previous life. Once collected, samples will be sent back to Earth from a small rocket deployed from the rover.
Scientists have recently found other signs of life on the red planet, including fluctuating levels of methane in the atmosphere. Some have proposed the idea that this gas may be coming from life below the surface.
On Earth, methane is produced from bacteria, primarily in the stomachs of animals and humans. Could there be bacteria, or life containing bacteria, producing that methane below the Martian surface?
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Stargates and Hidden Portals on Earth and in Space
In 2015, NASA admitted that the idea of Earth portals — areas on the planet that instantly teleport human beings from one place to the other — are a reality that they have been studying for quite some time.
One of NASA’s spacecraft, the THEMIS, and cluster probes from Europe have amassed enough observational data to confirm that a magnetic stargate portal exists in many locations.
Usually these are found where the faraway geomagnetic field bumps up against the passing solar wind. The result is a direct pathway between the Earth and the sun.
In March 2015, NASA launched its Magnetospheric Multiscale Mission (MMS) that, among other things, is tasked with studying these portals to gain a deeper understanding of them. Most of these are small with short lives, though others have been observed as gaping holes with sustained lifespans. Opening and closing numerous times during the day, magnetic forces mingle, allowing their crackling energy particles to flow between the Earth and the sun. These meeting points — called X-points by NASA — have been pinpointed by scientists using polar data.
The Bermuda Triangle
The Bermuda Triangle is probably the most famous stargate portal. Encompassing three vertices, the Bermuda Triangle — sometimes referred to as the Devil’s Triangle — is a large abyss that stretches between San Juan, Puerto Rico, Bermuda Island, and Miami, Florida. First noted in late 1950 or early 1951, the Bermuda Triangle was deemed to be a mysterious area in which huge military ships and planes were “lost” without any other plausible explanation forthcoming from the government or the military. In 1964, Vincent H. Gaddis argued that the Bermuda Triangle was the site of strange occurrences such as disappearing tanker ships and jets with the government being unwilling — or unable — to provide a reason or explanation.
The Philadelphia Experiment
The Philadelphia Experiment, also sometimes called Project Rainbow, grew out of the desire to cloak the U.S. Navy’s destroyer, USS Eldridge, so that enemy devices were not able to detect it. Built on concepts relative to stargate portals, the project relied on a technological application developed by well-known and respected scientific greats Nikola Tesla and Albert Einstein.
Testing started in 1943 and was successful to a large degree. In fact, some witnesses noted that they saw a green fog in the area where the massive ship once stood. Further experiments in late October resulted in the USS Eldridge vanishing from its shakedown cruise in the Bahamas. Simultaneously, sailors stationed 375 miles south at the Norfolk Naval Base in Norfolk, Virginia, reported the ship’s appearance for several minutes before it vanished.
Alfred Bielek, a former crew member on board the USS Eldridge, and Duncan Cameron, who would later work on the Montauk Project, jumped from the deck of the USS Eldridge when it was trapped in hyperspace and landed in the future.
Once they arrived at Camp Hero in 1983, they were tasked with returning to the USS Eldridge in order to destroy the equipment holding the ship in hyperspace. The pair did so successfully before leaping off the deck and materializing in the current year.
