The Probiotic Evolution of Mars

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I think we contaminated Mars. The question is whether anything we dragged out there would survive or not. There are probably still environments on Mars that we managed to not contaminate and it would be nice to keep it that way, but I don't have high hopes. Another problem though is that Earth is spreading crap as we speak. We're always shedding atmosphere and that atmosphere contains spores. And we know that those can travel. So if we find the Tardigrade on Mars, or more likely Tardigraded's Spore on Mars, that doesn't mean Tardigrades originated on Mars independently. No. More likely on Mars really than on Mars. More definitely.

Scientists can’t quite agree on how to define “life,” but that hasn’t stopped them from studying it, looking for it elsewhere, or even trying to create it. Kate Adamala is one of a number of scientists engaged in the ambitious project of trying to create living cells, or something approximating them, starting from entirely non-living ingredients. Impressive progress has already been made. Designing cells from scratch will have obvious uses is biology and medicine, but also allow us to build biological robots and computers, as well as helping us understand how life could have arisen in the first place, and what it might look like on other planets.

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Katarzyna (Kate) Adamala received her Ph.D. working with Pier Luigi Luisi at the University of Rome and Jack Szostak at Harvard. She is currently an assistant professor of Genetics, Cell Biology, and Development at the University of Minnesota. She is a member of the Build-A-Cell international collaboration, which brings together multiple groups to work on constructing artificial life.

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