The Daily Telegraph - 20.08.2019

Life on Mars?

UK’s ‘Rosalind’

will dig deep to

find the answer

By Sarah Knapton Science editor

THE possibility of life on Mars may
finally be answered in 2021 when a
British-built rover starts drilling deep
into the Red Planet’s surface looking
for signs of alien habitation.
Engineers at Airbus in Hertfordshire
are this week installing a suite of cam-
eras on the European Space Agency’s
ExoMars exploration vehicle before it
leaves for testing in France.
If all goes to plan, the “pan-cam” sys-
tem, designed by engineers at Univer-
sity College London, will be launched
from Kazakhstan nest year and will
land on Mars on March 19 2021.

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After 10 days of checks it will begin

scanning the surface of the planet, look-

ing for minerals and liquids that could

have hosted extraterrestrial organisms.

Once a potential hot spot is discov-

ered, the rover named “Rosalind

Franklin” after the first person to pho-

tograph DNA, will trundle to the area at

a speed of about 47in per hour, before

drilling more than 6ft into the ground

to take samples.

The Martian rocks will be fed

through an aperture on the rover into a

mobile laboratory where they will be

crushed up and examined for organic

matter. Confirmation of life could come

within weeks of the rover landing on

its £1.4 billion mission.

“One of the unique features of the

ExoMars rover is the capability to drill

down further than any other rover so

far,” said Sue Horne, head of space ex-

ploration at the UK Space Agency.

“Mars is really inhospitable, and all

the rovers so far have been scraping

around on the surface and they haven’t

found anything yet.

“Analysis of radiation damage has

shown that you have to get one metre

below the surface to get to regions that

haven’t been affected. Pan-cam is criti-

cal for the science. The minerals show

us where life might have once been.”

Hopes were raised in the search for

life on Mars in 2013 when Nasa’s Curi-

osity rover recorded methane “burps”

• a waste product of organisms on
  Earth. Scientists now think the gas
  probably came from geological activity,
  and believe there is little chance of

finding living organisms on the planet.

The team assembling the rover have

to adhere to strict hygiene rules set out

by Cospar, the UN’s Committee on

Space Research, which states they can-

not transport more than 9,800 bacte-

rial or viral spores to the surface. Not

only could it pollute the planet, but it

would also skew the science.

If they were to leave just one finger-

print on the rover before launch it

would need to be surgically cleaned all

over again which is why engineers

must wear hairnets, hoods, two pairs of

sterile gloves, overalls and a face mask.

They even wear goggles to prevent

eyelashes straying in to the machinery,

and one person – dubbed the “clean

buddy” – must watch colleagues to en-

sure they do not touch their faces and

contaminate the equipment.

Anna Nash, of UCL, who is responsi-

ble for “planetary protection” for the

project said: “Everything goes through

£1.4bn

The cost of the European Space

Agency’s ExoMars mission

EDDIE MULHOLLAND FOR THE TELEGRAPH

An engineer in

heavily protective

clothing, right, at

the Airbus defence

and space facility in

Stevenage, Herts.

The vehicle, left,

named Rosalind

Franklin, can travel

at a speed of 47in

per hour

British-built space

exploration vehicle with

drilling capability could

solve mystery of alien life

a seven-step solvent clean. We use ster-

ile swabs to swab everything down. We

then send off the equipment to a sepa-

rate lab and incubate for three days to

see if there is any bacterial growth. If

you have a situation where a tool is

dropped on the floor, that has to be sent

for cleaning which can take a week.”

Later this month the rover will be

shipped to Airbus in Toulouse for a se-

ries of mechanical vibration and ther-

mal tests to ensure it can survive the

bumpy launch conditions as well as the

frozen nights on Mars, where tempera-

tures dip to -150C (-238F) before rising

to 20C (68F), in the day.

Alcoholics could benefit from doses of ecstasy to conquer their addiction, study finds

By Laura Donnelly HealtH editor

THE drug MDMA, better known as the
party drug ecstasy, could be success-
fully used to treat alcohol addiction,
research suggests.
Early findings from the trial – the

first study to use the drug for such pur-

poses – indicates that it could prove

better than standard treatments.

Psychiatrists are testing a pro-

gramme which combines a few doses

of MDMA in conjunction with psycho-

therapy, After nine months, around

half of those in the small study re-

mained “completely dry” with just one

suffering a full relapse. The results also

found the drug was safe to use as part

of therapy, with no physical or psycho-

logical problems identified.

Dr Ben Sessa, an addiction psychia-

trist and senior research fellow at Im-

perial College London, who led the

trial, said: “With the very best that

medical science can work with, 80 per

cent of people are drinking within

three years post alcohol detox.”

Eleven people have so far completed

the safety and tolerability study, which

involves nine months of follow-ups.

“We’ve got one person who has com-

pletely relapsed back to previous drink-

ing levels, we have five people who are

completely dry and we have five who

have had one or two drinks but wouldn’t

reach the diagnosis of alcohol use disor-

der,” he told The Guardian.

The first stage of the new study was

only designed to show the therapy is

safe. Further trials will compare results

with a randomised control group who

receive a placebo instead of MDMA.

The Daily Telegraph Tuesday 20 August 2019 *** 9

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