Researchers from the Australian National University say that three per cent of Mars could sustain life, while just one per cent of Earth’s volume contains life – from the core to upper atmosphere.
However, the team say that most Earth-like organisms would need to retreat underground to survive on Mars.
Water find: Thanks to huge amounts of ice and warmer conditions underground, life could thrive on Mars
Astrobiologist Charley Lineweaver told AFP: ‘What we tried to do, simply, was take almost all of the information we could and put it together and say “is the big picture consistent with there being life on Mars?”’ And the simple answer is yes... There are large regions of Mars that are compatible with terrestrial life.’
Life could exist on Mars, scientists say, largely because there is a huge amount of water there in the form of ice, found at the polar regions.
But the pressure on the planet is so low that water would vaporise on the surface.
Below ground, however, there is sufficient pressure for water to be kept in a liquid state, which would enable microbes to thrive.
MARS-VELLOUS FACTS
On average it lies 141.6 million miles from the Sun.
With a diameter of 4,222 miles, it’s around half the size of the Earth.
It’s absolutely freezing there, with an average temperature of -85F (-65C).
Gravity is much less powerful - slightly less than 40 per cent of ours.
The atmosphere is desperately thin – one per cent of Earth’s pressure – and not very nice for us humans because 95 per cent of it is carbon dioxide.
It boasts the solar system’s biggest mountain – Olympus Mons, a dead volcano with staggering proportions. It measures 335 miles across and rises to a height of 88,000ft, which is almost three times higher than Everest.
Mars has two cosmic sidekicks – the moons Deimos and Phobos.
Mars’s red colouring comes from the iron oxide that coats its surface.
Mars has huge amounts of ice at its polar caps. If they melted, it would cover the whole planet in water 11-metres deep, according to Nasa.
And while the surface temperature is not ideal for life, being an extremely chilly -65C, below ground it would be much warmer thanks to heat from the planet’s core.
Lineweaver added that his study, which analysed decades of data, was ‘the best estimate yet published of how habitable Mars is to terrestrial microbes’.
Lineweaver's findings were published today in Astrobiology.
Scientists will learn a great deal more about Mars’s ability to sustain life when the rover Curiosity lands on the surface next August.
Nasa’s earlier Viking rovers concluded 35 years ago that there was no sign of life, but scientists hope Curiosity’s more sophisticated equipment will reveal more.
It will be 'the largest and most complex piece of equipment ever placed on the surface of another planet', said Doug McCuistion, director of Nasa’s Mars exploration programme.
The rover is expected to land on Mars on August 5, 2012, after travelling nearly 354million miles from our planet.
One of the chief tasks of the $2.5billion mission will be to discover the source of the methane gas scientists have detected in the Martian air.
It will also fire a laser beam with the energy of a million lightbulbs at the surface of the red planet to see whether or not it could have supported life.
The international team of space explorers that launched the Mars Science Laboratory is relying on the instrument to look for biological signs on the distant world.
The ChemCam will fire a powerful laser pulse, vaporising some Mars dust and examining the spectrum of light shining through it.
The robust system is one of 10 instruments mounted on the mission's rover vehicle.
Analysis: The ChemCam system uses a laser to take samples from as far as 23 feet away from the Curiosity rover
Exploring: Opportunity is about to spend its fifth winter on Mars
When ChemCam fires its extremely powerful laser pulse, it will vaporise an area the size of a pinhead.
The system's telescope will peer at the flash of glowing plasma created by the vaporized material and record the colours of light contained within it.
These spectral colours will then be interpreted by a spectrometer, enabling scientists to determine the elemental composition of the vaporised material.
Hardy: Opportunity has covered an impressive 21 miles on the Martian surface
Meanwhile, Nasa's lone surviving Mars rover Opportunity is scouting the landscape in search of a place to spend its fifth winter.
The solar-powered robot geologist has been scouting out sites along the crater rim that not only have interesting rocks to examine but also ample sunshine. The hardy rover has survived four previous Martian winters and scientists expect no different and even drew up a to-do list.
Opportunity will ‘keep active all winter long’, said Bruce Banerdt, rover project scientist at Nasa headquarters.
The probe has so far covered around 21 miles of the Martian surface. ( dailymail.co.uk )
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