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| title | chunk | source | category | tags | date_saved | instance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Viking lander biological experiments | 2/4 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking_lander_biological_experiments | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T13:26:28.096600+00:00 | kb-cron |
=== Labeled release === The labeled release (LR) experiment (PI: Gilbert Levin, Biospherics Inc.) gave the most promise for exobiologists. In the LR experiment, a sample of Martian soil was inoculated with a drop of very dilute aqueous nutrient solution. The nutrients (7 molecular compounds that were Miller-Urey products) were tagged with radioactive 14C. The air above the soil was monitored for the evolution of radioactive 14CO2 (or other carbon-based) gas as evidence that microorganisms in the soil had metabolized one or more of the nutrients. Such a result was to be followed with the control part of the experiment as described for the PR below. The result was quite a surprise, considering the negative results of the first two tests, with a steady stream of radioactive gases being given off by the soil immediately following the first injection. The experiment was done by both Viking probes, the first using a sample from the surface exposed to sunlight and the second probe taking the sample from underneath a rock; both initial injections came back positive. Sterilization control tests were subsequently carried out by heating various soil samples. Samples heated for 3 hours at 160 °C gave off no radioactive gas when nutrients were injected, and samples heated for 3 hours at 50 °C exhibited a substantial reduction in radioactive gas released following nutrient injection. A sample stored at 10 °C for several months was later tested showing significantly reduced radioactive gas release. A CNN article from 2000 noted that "Though most of his peers concluded otherwise, Levin still holds that the robot tests he coordinated on the 1976 Viking lander indicated the presence of living organisms on Mars." A 2006 astrobiology textbook noted that "With unsterilized Terrestrial samples, though, the addition of more nutrients after the initial incubation would then produce still more radioactive gas as the dormant bacteria sprang into action to consume the new dose of food. This was not true of the Martian soil; on Mars, the second and third nutrient injections did not produce any further release of labeled gas." The 2011 edition of the same textbook noted that "Albet Yen of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory has shown that, under extremely cold and dry conditions and in a carbon dioxide atmosphere, ultraviolet light (remember: Mars lacks an ozone layer, so the surface is bathed in ultraviolet) can cause carbon dioxide to react with soils to produce various oxidizers, including highly reactive superoxides (salts containing O2−). When mixed with small organic molecules, superoxidizers readily oxidize them to carbon dioxide, which may account for the LR result. Superoxide chemistry can also account for the puzzling results seen when more nutrients were added to the soil in the LR experiment; because life multiplies, the amount of gas should have increased when a second or third batch of nutrients was added, but if the effect was due to a chemical being consumed in the first reaction, no new gas would be expected. Lastly, many superoxides are relatively unstable and are destroyed at elevated temperatures, also accounting for the "sterilization" seen in the LR experiment." In a 2002 paper, Joseph Miller speculates that recorded delays in the system's chemical reactions point to biological activity similar to the circadian rhythm previously observed in terrestrial cyanobacteria. A 2007 paper by Dirk Schulze-Makuch and Joop M. Houtkooper argues that the experiment may have killed potential microbes by supplying them with an excessive amount of water. Schulze-Makuch revisited the idea in an article for Big Think in 2023. On 12 April 2012, an international team including Levin and Patricia Ann Straat published a peer reviewed paper suggesting the detection of "extant microbial life on Mars", based on mathematical speculation through cluster analysis of the Labeled Release experiments of the 1976 Viking Mission.
=== Pyrolytic release === The pyrolytic release (PR) experiment (PI: Norman Horowitz, Caltech) consisted of the use of light, water, and a carbon-containing atmosphere of carbon monoxide (CO) and carbon dioxide (CO2), simulating that on Mars. The carbon-bearing gases were made with carbon-14 (14C), a heavy, radioactive isotope of carbon. If there were photosynthetic organisms present, it was believed that they would incorporate some of the carbon as biomass through the process of carbon fixation, just as plants and cyanobacteria on earth do. After several days of incubation, the experiment removed the gases, baked the remaining soil at 650 °C (1200 °F), and collected the products in a device which counted radioactivity. If any of the 14C had been converted to biomass, it would be vaporized during heating and the radioactivity counter would detect it as evidence for life. Should a positive response be obtained, a duplicate sample of the same soil would be heated to "sterilize" it. It would then be tested as a control and should it still show activity similar to the first response, that was evidence that the activity was chemical in nature. However, a nil, or greatly diminished response, was evidence for biology. This same control was to be used for any of the three life detection experiments that showed a positive initial result. The initial assessment of results from the Viking 1 PR experiment was that "analysis of the results shows that a small but significant formation of organic matter occurred" and that the sterilized control showed no evidence of organics, showing that the "findings could be attributed to biological activity." However, given the persistence of organic release at 90 °C, the inhibition of organics after injecting water vapor and, especially, the lack of detection of organics in the Martian soil by the GCMS experiment, the investigators concluded that a nonbiological explanation of the PR results was most likely. However, in subsequent years, as the GCMS results have come increasingly under scrutiny, the pyrolytic release experiment results have again come to be viewed as possibly consistent with biological activity, although "An explanation for the apparent small synthesis of organic matter in the pyrolytic release experiment remains obscure."
== Scientific conclusions ==