The discovery has implications in the search for potential signs of life on the Red Planet, researchers said.
As scientists get more data from Mars, they are gaining a clearer picture of the variations across its regions, providing a more comprehensive understanding of organic compounds on the Red Planet. This will help them understand whether life could have ever evolved there, according to Razzell Hollis.
"With the data we currently have, we can't be certain which process dominated in any given situation, but we see multiple signals consistent with organics that appear to vary across the units of the crater floor and in the minerals they are spatially associated with," Razzell Hollis said."Things do not look the same everywhere in Jezero, and that is exciting."
"We are intrigued by these signals since they could be organic and would point to the possibility that building blocks of life could have been present for a long time on the surface of Mars, in more than one place," Razzell Hollis said."We would need [to wait for the samples' return] to confirm the presence, type and mineral associations of organic molecules before we can consider whether they are specific evidence of past life.
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