[profound (OP)]

Nasa says they are looking for life on Mars past and present and have sent various probes to Mars.

However their way of finding life on Mars is very convoluted and relies on assorted chemical reactions
which can be open to interpretation in unlimited number of ways.

Why not just send a solid state microscope to Mars.
You can buy a cheap usb solid state microscope on ebay for $10 for direct imaging.

For Nasa add 5 zeros so that it costs $1000000 and send it to Mars to send pictures/videos as it scans soil samples for life previous or now.

Curiosity has 2 microscopes on it but NASA says they will never use them for life detection and are only interested in dull rock samples and their analysis.

[Bored chemist]

Nasa says they are looking for life on Mars past and present and have sent various probes to Mars.

However their way of finding life on Mars is very convoluted and relies on assorted chemical reactions
which can be open to interpretation in unlimited number of ways.

Why not just send a solid state microscope to Mars.
You can buy a cheap usb solid state microscope on ebay for $10 for direct imaging.

For Nasa add 5 zeros so that it costs $1000000 and send it to Mars to send pictures/videos as it scans soil samples for life previous or now.

Curiosity has 2 microscopes on it but NASA says they will never use them for life detection and are only interested in dull rock samples and their analysis.

Because the planet is big, and the field of view of a microscope is small.
Unless you happened to find life on the mm square you can see with your microscope, it wouldn't tell you anything.
But if you analyse the atmosphere it will tell you about life anywhere on the planet.

[profound (OP)]

Nasa says they are looking for life on Mars past and present and have sent various probes to Mars.

However their way of finding life on Mars is very convoluted and relies on assorted chemical reactions
which can be open to interpretation in unlimited number of ways.

Why not just send a solid state microscope to Mars.
You can buy a cheap usb solid state microscope on ebay for $10 for direct imaging.

For Nasa add 5 zeros so that it costs $1000000 and send it to Mars to send pictures/videos as it scans soil samples for life previous or now.

Curiosity has 2 microscopes on it but NASA says they will never use them for life detection and are only interested in dull rock samples and their analysis.

Because the planet is big, and the field of view of a microscope is small.
Unless you happened to find life on the mm square you can see with your microscope, it wouldn't tell you anything.
But if you analyse the atmosphere it will tell you about life anywhere on the planet.

Well they have been analysing the atmosphere for yonks ...40 years..since the viking landers and nothing to show for it apart from conflicting and confusing results subject to endless interpretation.

Your narrow field view comment is absurd.the soil samples would be moving under the microscope or the microscope could move.

[chris]

If life existed / exists on Mars then it's probably microbial. To see bacteria with a light microscope is tricky on Earth. You need a decent prep, a stain and a reasonable sample.

It's not practical to search for life with a light microscope. Instead the approach that is being taken is to look for chemical fingerprints potentially associated with life processes, and then narrow the search once we know where to look...

[profound (OP)]

If life existed / exists on Mars then it's probably microbial. To see bacteria with a light microscope is tricky on Earth. You need a decent prep, a stain and a reasonable sample.

It's not practical to search for life with a light microscope. Instead the approach that is being taken is to look for chemical fingerprints potentially associated with life processes, and then narrow the search once we know where to look...

microscopes have come a long way since you were at college...the latest ones can do this automatically since year 2007.
you seem to be out of touch with the latest tech.

And chemical processes can produce an endless series of vague fingerprints.
26 letters in the alphabet.billions of words.
over 90 elements in the periodic table...trillions of combinations and permutations...

a picture is worth a thousand words.

[Bored chemist]

microscopes have come a long way since you were at college...the latest ones can do this automatically since year 2007.

That's neat.
can you post a link?

[chris]

microscopes have come a long way since you were at college...the latest ones can do this automatically since year 2007.

Yes, do please tell us where we can get one, because at the moment I'm wasting a fortune in my lab paying expensive humans to prep gram stains on clinical samples. I'll go and buy one and put it to work immediately.

[Bored chemist]

Come to think of it, what stains do you use for alien bacteria?
Seems a bit like this
"And chemical processes can produce an endless series of vague fingerprints.
26 letters in the alphabet.billions of words.
over 90 elements in the periodic table...trillions of combinations and permutations..."

[Kryptid]

There's probably some way that you can automate the microscopy process, but there is a premium on weight and space when it comes to Mars landers: everything that is on them has to earn their way on. If there was any practical way to do this various space agencies have probably considered it, but I'm guessing it lost to other instruments that were considered to be more important.

[RD]

Curiosity has 2 microscopes on it but NASA says they will never use them for life detection and are only interested in dull rock samples and their analysis.

I very much doubt NASA used the phrase "never use them for life detection"  : as the "dull rock samples" could contain fossils. 

The current composition of Mars atmosphere gives no reason to expect life is present now ... http://www.jameslovelock.org/page28.html

The optics on the surface of Mars can see things smaller than a human-hair ... https://msl-scicorner.jpl.nasa.gov/Instruments/MAHLI/

[profound (OP)]

microscopes have come a long way since you were at college...the latest ones can do this automatically since year 2007.

Yes, do please tell us where we can get one, because at the moment I'm wasting a fortune in my lab paying expensive humans to prep gram stains on clinical samples. I'll go and buy one and put it to work immediately.

Just google it.

i saw it advertised in 2007.things have come a long way since.you need to keep up with progress.

it is well known that older people brains get ossified due to age,mentality stuck in a rut syndrome making them resistant to new things.Even Kirk said French minds new ideas.

[Bored chemist]

Just google it.

That's your job, not ours.
You made the claim, and it falls to you to prove it.

[profound (OP)]

There's probably some way that you can automate the microscopy process, but there is a premium on weight and space when it comes to Mars landers: everything that is on them has to earn their way on. If there was any practical way to do this various space agencies have probably considered it, but I'm guessing it lost to other instruments that were considered to be more important.

Again you seem to thinking to preschool ages when a mass spectrometers occupied large 1 metre by 1/2 meters desks but NASA miniaturized it to a shoebox.

Yoof minds fresh ideas.

[profound (OP)]

Just google it.

That's your job, not ours.
You made the claim, and it falls to you to prove it.

no.

i feel it would be wrong to spoonfeed you.if you did some of your own research you might learn something new.

[profound (OP)]

microscopes have come a long way since you were at college...the latest ones can do this automatically since year 2007.

Yes, do please tell us where we can get one, because at the moment I'm wasting a fortune in my lab paying expensive humans to prep gram stains on clinical samples. I'll go and buy one and put it to work immediately.

i just looked up automated microscopes with thousands of results.see when you save money using my idea could you keep half the savings and send me the remainder as i feel without my help you would still be doing old fashioned things.

you dont to do staining nonsense either.so old fashioned.

 Standard brightfield microscopy relies upon light from the lamp source being gathered by the substage condenser and shaped into a cone whose apex is focused at the plane of the specimen. Specimens are seen because of their ability to change the speed and the path of the light passing through them. This ability is dependent upon the refractive index and the opacity of the specimen. To see a specimen in a brightfield microscope, the light rays passing through it must be changed sufficiently to be able to interfere with each other which produces contrast (differences in light intensities) and, thereby, build an image. If the specimen has a refractive index too similar to the surrounding medium between the microscope stage and the objective lens, it will not be seen. To visualize biological materials well, the materials must have this inherent contrast caused by the proper refractive indices or be artificially stained. These limitations require instructors to find naturally high contrast materials or to enhance contrast by staining them which often requires killing them. Adequately visualizing transparent living materials or thin unstained specimens is not possible with a brightfield microscope.

Darkfield microscopy relies on a different illumination system. Rather than illuminating the sample with a filled cone of light, the condenser is designed to form a hollow cone of light. The light at the apex of the cone is focused at the plane of the specimen; as this light moves past the specimen plane it spreads again into a hollow cone. The objective lens sits in the dark hollow of this cone; although the light travels around and past the objective lens, no rays enter it (Fig. 1). The entire field appears dark when there is no sample on the microscope stage; thus the name darkfield microscopy. When a sample is on the stage, the light at the apex of the cone strikes it. The image is made only by those rays scattered by the sample and captured in the objective lens (note the rays scattered by the specimen in Figure 1). The image appears bright against the dark background. This situation can be compared to the glittery appearance of dust particles in a dark room illuminated by strong shafts of light coming in through a side window. The dust particles are very small, but are easily seen when they scatter the light rays. This is the working principle of darkfield microscopy and explains how the image of low contrast material is created: an object will be seen against a dark background if it scatters light which is captured with the proper device such as an objective lens.

The highest quality darkfield microscopes are equipped with specialized costly condensers constructed only for darkfield application. This darkfield effect can be achieved in a brightfield microscope, however, by the addition of a simple "stop". The stop is a piece of opaque material placed below the substage condenser; it blocks out the center of the beam of light coming from the base of the microscope and forms the hollow cone of light needed for darkfield illumination. ...


http://www.nature.com/nprot/journal/v7/n9/fig_tab/nprot.2012.096_T1.html?foxtrotcallback=true

[Colin2B]

you dont to do staining nonsense either.so old fashioned.

We are all very familiar with brightfield and darkfield techniques, but what makes you think staining is nonsense??

[profound (OP)]

you dont to do staining nonsense either.so old fashioned.

We are all very familiar with brightfield and darkfield techniques, but what makes you think staining is nonsense??

For an automated system you dont need the complexity and expense of staining.

The semiconductor industry uses AUTOMATED HIGH RESOLUTION microscopes to check billions of chips to check for defects.

[Colin2B]

For an automated system you dont need the complexity and expense of staining.

The semiconductor industry uses AUTOMATED HIGH RESOLUTION microscopes to check billions of chips to check for defects.

That isn't an answer to the question. Chip screening doesn't use staining.

[chris]

you dont to do staining nonsense either.so old fashioned.

We are all very familiar with brightfield and darkfield techniques, but what makes you think staining is nonsense??

For an automated system you dont need the complexity and expense of staining.

What ARE you talking about? A gram stain takes a few minutes and is as cheap as chips. In a clinical sample, a gram stain can make the difference between life and death for a meningitis sufferer. I should know, I saved a patient's life thanks to a gram stain when I was a junior doctor.

[profound (OP)]

you dont to do staining nonsense either.so old fashioned.

We are all very familiar with brightfield and darkfield techniques, but what makes you think staining is nonsense??

For an automated system you dont need the complexity and expense of staining.

What ARE you talking about? A gram stain takes a few minutes and is as cheap as chips. In a clinical sample, a gram stain can make the difference between life and death for a meningitis sufferer. I should know, I saved a patient's life thanks to a gram stain when I was a junior doctor.

I explained it above.we are not saving lives but looking for life on Mars so staining which would add to the complexity to an AUTOMATED SYSTEM IS NOT REQUIRED.DO YOU SEE NOW?