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Possible present day habitats for life on Mars (Including potential Mars special regions): Difference between revisions
Possible present day habitats for life on Mars (Including potential Mars special regions) (edit)
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* '''''Lack of nitrogen'''''. All life on Earth requires nitrogen. Also there are theoretical reasons for expecting alien organic life to use nitrogen, as the weaker nitrogen based amide bonds are essential for the processes by which DNA is replicated. Mars, compared with Earth, has little nitrogen, either in the air or in the soil. Levels of nitrogen in the air are low, possibly too low for nitrogen fixation to be possible. But they can form in Martian conditions by non biological processes - either brought to Mars by meteorites (some carbonaceous chondrites are rich in nitrogen<ref>{{cite web|title=Meteorite with abundant nitrogen for life on Earth?|url=
Life on Mars may be limited to locations with local abundance of nitrates. Or, it may also be able to take advantage of fixation of nitrogen in monolayers of water, a process that can happen in present-day Mars conditions, and may be able to produce enough nitrates to supply a subsurface biosphere.<ref name="BoxeHand2012">{{cite journal|url=https://authors.library.caltech.edu/30213/1/Boxe2012p17592Int_J_Astrobiol.pdf|last1=Boxe|first1=C.S.|last2=Hand|first2=K.P.|last3=Nealson|first3=K.H.|last4=Yung|first4=Y.L.|last5=Saiz-Lopez|first5=A.|title=An active nitrogen cycle on Mars sufficient to support a subsurface biosphere|journal=International Journal of Astrobiology|volume=11|issue=2|year=2012|pages=109–115|issn=1473-5504|doi=10.1017/S1473550411000401|bibcode=2012IJAsB..11..109B}}</ref>
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