Over 40 years ago, a NASA mission may have accidentally destroyed what would have been the first discovery of organic molecules on Mars, according to a report from New Scientist.
In 1976, the United States sent a pair of space probes, known as Viking 1 and Viking 2, to Mars.
In 1976, two Viking landers became the first US spacecraft from Earth to touch down on Mars. They took the first high-resolution images of the planet, surveyed the planet’s geographical features, and analyzed the geological composition of the atmosphere and surface. Perhaps most intriguingly, they also performed experiments that searched for signs of microbial life in Martian soil.
Even 40 years later, the NASA Viking 1 and 2 data still inspires for Mars exploration to this day.
