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Posted by: Sunspot Feb 16 2005, 09:20 PM

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn7014

A leading European Space Agency scientist says he has found a gas in the Martian atmosphere that he believes can only be explained by the presence of life. But the few researchers who have been privy to the facts say that such a conclusion is premature.

Posted by: brachiopod Feb 18 2005, 05:36 PM

This is being retracted, or something... see

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2005/feb/HQ_05052_mars_claim.html

-Bryan

Posted by: MahFL Feb 18 2005, 05:56 PM

Darn, no Martians yet............

Posted by: Sunspot Feb 18 2005, 06:27 PM

No, that's a rebuttal to an online article that appeared at space.com. The New Scientist article referrs to work by Vittorio Formisano to be presented at a conference in the Netherlands next week.

Posted by: OWW Feb 24 2005, 08:36 AM

Strange. The dutch program 'twee vandaag' interviewed Vittorio Formisano, but don't ask how. Before it even began some ESA representative storms in and demanded that it be made clear that Formisano's views are not ESA's.

Watch it ( it's in dutch, but the interview itself is in english ):

low quality:
http://www.tweevandaag.com/call.php?module=PX_Video&func=view&vid=18808&vtype=rnb

high quality:
http://www.tweevandaag.com/call.php?module=PX_Video&func=view&vid=18808&vtype=rwb

Posted by: TheChemist Feb 24 2005, 10:30 AM

I watched it, and the sequence of events is weird.
At some point I think Formisano threatens not to speak on Friday (I suppose he is referring to a schedulled ESA interview ?) if he is not allowed to speak to the reporter ?

There is tension in the air

It seems obvious, also taking into account the change of Formisano's poster title a while back, that ESA would like him to be a little more cautious and conservative in his views. I find it encouraging that he stands on his story firmly.

Posted by: Sunspot Feb 24 2005, 12:27 PM

So Vittorio Formisano's prenstation is on Friday 25th Feb then? I wondered why we hadn't heard much about it yet.

Posted by: slinted Feb 24 2005, 01:40 PM

According to the program(me) at : http://www.congrex.nl/05C05/programme.html "Methane, formaldehyde and water by PFS, V. Formisano" is today as a part of the exobiology session.

Posted by: TheChemist Mar 14 2005, 06:37 PM

http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object/index.cfm?fobjectid=36537

A lot of the full presentations are available now in PDF (not the abstracts). Formizano's is interesting

http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object/doc.cfm?fobjectid=36763