Is there lyfe on Mars? New concept broadens search for alien organisms

Research suggests standard definition of life may be too restrictive for complexities of space

When the Perseverance rover takes off from Cape Canaveral in Florida as scheduled on Thursday it will be Nasa's first mission to the surface of the red planet with the primary goal of finding signs of past life.

For astrobiologists, this search for life beyond Earth can be compared to a game of darts. Hitting the bullseye would mean finding life as we know it". In other words, life based on a biology analogous to that found on Earth. But as any darts player knows, the bullseye is a small target, hard to hit and not even the highest scoring area on the board.