The clearest signs yet that Mars may have once hosted life.

This week on Planetary Radio.

I'm Sarah Al-Ahmad of the Planetary Society, with more of the human adventure across our solar system and beyond.

NASA's Perseverance Rover has uncovered intriguing chemical clues inside a sample called Sapphire Canyon,

collected from the rock nicknamed Cheava Falls in Jesro Crater's Bright Angel Formation.

The chemistry points to potential biosignatures, hints that ancient microbial life may have once existed on Mars.

We'll begin with a clip from Morgan Cable, research scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory

and co-de deputy principal investigator of the pixel instrument on perseverance, as she explains

the importance of the sample. Then explore the details with Joel Horowitz, lead author of the

New Nature paper analyzing the results. And later, Bruce Betts, our chief scientist, joins me for

What's Up, where we'll look back at earlier moments in the exploration of Mars where scientists

and the public alike were thrilled by hints of life. If you love planetary radio and want to stay informed about the latest space discoveries,

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the cosmos and our place within it.

NASA's Perseverance Rover has been exploring Jesro Crater since 2021,

a place once home to an ancient river Delta where water flowed into a vast Martian lake.

The rover's continuing mission, to search for signs of past habitability,

and to collect rock cores that could someday be returned to search for signs of past habitability and to collect rock

cores that could someday be returned to Earth for analysis. Then, in July of 2024,

perseverance drilled into a rock in the bright angel formation. That's an ancient riverbed on

Jezero's Western Edge. The team nicknamed that rock Cheava Falls and then sealed the resulting sample into a

...