This is Science Friday. I am I Replato. This week, NASA reported that a sample collected by the

Perseverance rover on Mars contains chemicals that could, and I underline, could, be a sign of ancient life.

Seems like I've heard that kind of claim somewhere before. Here with more on

that and other stories from the Week in Science is Omer Irfan, senior correspondent at Vox in

Washington, D.C. Welcome back. Hi, Ira. Thanks for having me. Considering the history of false alarms

about finding evidence of life on Mars rocks, it almost feels like deja vu all over again.

It does, but this time NASA scientists say it's one of the strongest signs of life on Mars that

they've found to date. The sample was actually collected last year, and it was very tantalizing

at the time, but they really wanted to make sure that they ruled out all the other possibilities as best as they could.

And so they spent the past year analyzing the sample.

It was collected from a region in Mars that was known to likely have water in the past and also some of the important minerals that we need for life.

And the sample gets called Sapphire Canyon,

they analyzed it and they found that it does show like it has biosignatures, basically that it

has patterns on it that seem consistent with processes of life. And crucially, they look a lot

like what we see in sediment samples here on Earth. Now, the scientists do know, and they do caution,

that this is not a confirmation, that there are other potential inorganic mechanisms that can

cause this pattern that they saw in the rock, these leopard spots. But it's, again, what they say

is the most suggestive sign of life on mars that we've seen to date right

okay well wait to see how that turns out back here on earth there is a long running study

about the science of decision making in the brain tell me about this please well 22 labs over

the last seven years have been working together to map

out brain activity. Now, they're looking at mice, but they're a useful model organism,

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