This is surprising why? Bacteria survived nearly three years of exposure to outer space. When parts of Surveyor 3 were brought back by the astronauts on the Apollo 12 mission they had living bacteria on them.

Zing!

some of the strains of bacteria were shown to survive up to 28 hours under these conditions

Not exactly what I was thinking when I heard "hospitable"

Mom vagina's are loose, car keys you lose.

Translation: We've most likely contaminated Mars...

/oops

Lots of headlines these days seem to begin with "Much like your Mom's vagina...".

Low blow man. Low blow.

Subby, your FACE harbors exotic forms of bacteria!

I just had lunch and the headline made my stomach roll a little.

wildsnowllama: Translation: We've most likely contaminated Mars...

/oops

Not at all, we^* have been very careful since figuring out that such things can survive interplanetary travel. The interesting thing here is that if we can show that it's hospitable to bacteria, then there's a good chance some will be there.

* by we, I mean the U.S., I make no such claims for Russia's Mars 2 and Mars 3 probes.

fark you, subby! I just gave my mom a douche this morning.

FTFA linked to by Slashdot:

Galletta's team found that the vegetative cells of the bacteria died after only a few minutes

Vegetative cells of Bacillus are the growing, metabolically active forms. Only the spores could "survive", and then only 28 days. Spores survive millenia on earth.

Archae hippy: Only the spores could "survive", and then only 28 days.

And then, 28 days later...

AHAHAA AHAHAHA!

Subby wins 1 intarnets.

I've NEVER heard this joke before! NEVER! OMG it's so damn FUNNY!!!!

/sigh

Gee. Such a clever headline. For an 8 year old.


//your momma went out with J.J. and platform shoes

indarwinsshadow: Gee. Such a clever headline. For an 8 year old.


//your momma went out with J.J. and platform shoes

I hear yo momma so fat, she once, twice, three times a lady.

What passes for clever headlines these days is pretty damn sorry.

What passes for links these days is pretty damn sorry.

PROTIP: Try linking to the actual article rather than a site that only has the first paragraph of the article.

CVGScorch: AHAHAA AHAHAHA!

Subby wins 1 intarnets.

I've NEVER heard this joke before! NEVER! OMG it's so damn FUNNY!!!!

/sigh

Fark you, I laughed. I always enjoy a good mom joke.

DubyaHater: CVGScorch: AHAHAA AHAHAHA!

Subby wins 1 intarnets.

I've NEVER heard this joke before! NEVER! OMG it's so damn FUNNY!!!!

/sigh

Fark you, I laughed. I always enjoy a good mom joke.

I always enjoy a good your mom.

Lots of hate for an headline that made me guffaw.

Subby, you seem to have offended the leets. +1 for crassness

paging gorgor

"mom's vagina"

loved the headline

They're probably already there. Bacteria living in rock microfissures delivered there as ejecta from meteorite impacts.

It'll be fascinating to sequence the DNA of Martian microbes. It'll be like a snapshot of Earth's evolutionary history.

Probably the best your mom joke ever.

/I'm serious.
//+1
///Not subby

gilgamesh23: They're probably already there. Bacteria living in rock microfissures delivered there as ejecta from meteorite impacts.

Wait, I thought Martian rocks coming here was easy, because of Mars' lighter gravity and the fact we're downhill (closer to the Sun), but Earth rocks getting there would be much harder.

theorellior: Wait, I thought Martian rocks coming here was easy, because of Mars' lighter gravity and the fact we're downhill (closer to the Sun), but Earth rocks getting there would be much harder.

Yeah, I was just pulling things out of my ass there. But Earth escape velocity is like 11 km/sec and it wouldn't take much more than that to get something out to Mars I would guess, since the acceleration imparted by the Sun isn't so great.

Anyone know what the odds of a rock being ejected at, say 15 km/sec and not becoming molten or vaporized on the way out/during the impact event? Or that a rock could be ejected at 15 km/sec at all?

...off to do some quick calculations...

Okay, my premise was totally off. The material would need to be ejected at somewhere above 30 km/sec even after escaping from Earth's gravity well, it appears, to overcome the Sun's gravity. Even though solar gravity only imparts an acceleration of around 0.006 m/s² at the distance of Earth's orbit, it would have a long time to work on something making a 100 million kilometer journey. So now we're talking about something ejected from the surface at 40 or 50 km/sec.

So I apologize for randomly shooting my mouth off. Maybe that's doable, but solar gravity is a biatch in this instance.

bumkusfiveal: loved the headline

so did your mom.

If we find Mars is lifeless, and we find strains of bacteria that can live on Mars, wouldn't it almost be our duty to spread that life to Mars?

Of course, it's probably our duty to try to spread us to Mars if possible.

Perhaps this is something that will be tested further in a few years by the Mars Science Lab, also known as "Curiosity"

Curiosity killed the cat humanity when it brought back a lethal bacterium.