Almost no earthly environment is out of bounds for bacteria, including the atmosphere.
Here, one might claim that Oscar's memory content is partly determined not by the Earthly environment in which the memory was formed.
In other words, just as nearly any earthly environment can grow moss, so too can just about any star system grow small, hard planets like Mercury, Mars, Venus and Earth.
Then, suddenly, a melody emerges, a small but unmistakable voice, both earthly and alien, of its environment yet distinct within it.
On its way to Mount Sharp in the middle of Gale Crater, Curiosity has been turning up a wealth of evidence that Mars could have contained living things: A water-rich environment, low acidity, elements key for Earthly life — hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur and phosphorus.
Earthly life has proved remarkably hardy in similar extreme environments such as hydrothermal vents on the ocean floor and polar ice.
Other than that, move on to face life as life expects from you to do the right thing by unfolding each day its Earthly and precious commodities of nature, such as water, sun, and environment before you and as it does for all living species on the face of the planet and be considered of its precious properties.
The swell, chosen as a simulation site for its topical resemblance to Mars, provides researchers with an opportunity to live and work in an environment that's as close to outer space as is earthly possible.
The surface may not have been wet for all of that period, notes Dr Grotzinger, but groundwater could have persisted even when the surface was temporarily dry.The sort of environment described in the paper is the kind that plenty of Earthly organisms would thrive in.
Methods to search for life in these icy environments and adequate protocols to prevent contamination can be tested with earthly analogues.
"Frankly, the fear is not so much that any martian microbes would be pathogenic, but that they might find some useful resource in us or our environment". Imagine if they formed inert lumps in our bodies, or functionally displaced other kinds of earthly organisms.
