Displaying items by tag: Mars
Martian genome: Is there DNA on the Red Planet?
Craig Venter helped crack the human genome, created the first synthetic cell and has scoured the sea for novel genomes. Now he has set his sights on Mars. Earlier this week at the Wired Health Conference in New York, he outlined plans to send a robotically controlled genome-sequencing unit, or "biological teleporter", to the Red Planet in order to sequence the genome of alien life that may be there. He's not the first to suggest doing this. Do any of these missions stand a chance?
How will Venter's scheme work?
In short, he wants to send machinery to Mars that can robotically sift through Martian soil to isolate any microbes it contains, sequence their DNA and then beam the digitised results back to Earth. These would be used to create a synthetic version of the Martian genome, which could then be used to recreate Martian life on Earth – all without having to deal with the difficulties of actually bringing the sample back.
Read more...by Colin Barras and Lisa Grossman, NewScientist, 19 October 2012
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