The most Martian place on Earth | Armando Azua-Bustos

Prevodilac: Mirjana Čutura Lektor: Tijana Mihajlović

This is a picture of a sunset on Mars

Ovo je fotografija zalaska sunca na Marsu

taken by NASA's Curiosity rover in 2013.

koju je Nasin rover Kjuriositi snimio 2013. godine.

Mars is a very cold planet,

Mars je veoma hladna planeta

flooded with high levels of UV radiation

sa mnoštvom ultraljubičastog zračenja visokih nivoa

i veoma je suv.

and extremely dry.

U stvari, Mars se smatra suviše suvim za život kakav mi znamo.

In fact, Mars is considered to be too dry for life as we know it.

I'm an astrobiologist.

Ja sam astrobiolog.

I try to understand the origin of life on Earth

Pokušavam da razumem poreklo života na Zemlji

i mogućnosti pronalaska života

and the possibilities of finding life

elsewhere in the universe.

drugde u svemiru.

People sometimes ask me,

Ljudi me ponekad pitaju:

how can you be an astrobiologist

„Kako možeš biti astrobiolog

if you don't have your own spaceship?

ako nemaš svoj lični svemirski brod?“

Well, what I do is that I study life

Ja proučavam život

in those environments on Earth

u onim sredinama na Zemlji

that most closely resemble other interesting places in the universe.

koje najviše liče na druga zanimljiva mesta u svemiru.

Sav život na Zemlji zahteva vodu,

All life on Earth requires water,

so in my case I focus on the intimate relationship

tako da se ja fokusiram na prisnu vezu

između vode i života

between water and life

in order to understand

da bih razumeo

if we could find life in a planet as dry as Mars.

da li možemo naći život na planeti koja je suva koliko i Mars.

But since I do not have the 2.5 billion dollars

Međutim, pošto nemam dve i po milijarde dolara

da pošaljem svoj ličnog robota na Mars,

to send my own robot to Mars,

I study the most Martian place on Earth,

ja proučavam mesto na Zemlji najviše nalik Marsu,

pustinju Atakama.

the Atacama Desert.

Located in northern Chile,

Smeštena na severu Čilea,

it is the oldest and driest desert on Earth.

to je najstarija i najsuvlja pustinja na Zemlji.

Da bih vam dao ideju koliko je suva,

To give you an idea of how dry it is,

uzmite u obzir da ovde u Vankuveru padne preko hiljadu milimetara kiše godišnje.

consider here in Vancouver it rains over 1,000 millimeters of rain every year.

In the Atacama, there are places with no reported rains

U Atakami postoje mesta gde kiša nije zabeležena

in the last 400 years.

u poslednjih 400 godina.

How do I know this?

Kako ja to znam?

Well, because I was born and raised in the Atacama --

Rođen sam i odrastao u Atakami,

(Smeh)

(Laughter)

So I had a unique advantage

tako da sam imao jedinstvenu prednost

when I started studying this desert.

kada sam počeo da proučavam ovu pustinju.

So let me tell you guys a few fantastic examples

Dozvolite mi da vam dam nekoliko fantastičnih primera

he has found

koje je on našao

o tome kako se živa bića prilagođavaju da žive sa skoro nimalo vode.

on how life has adapted to live with almost no water at all.

One of my first findings was in the entrance of a cave

Jedno od mojih prvih otkrića je bilo na ulasku u pećinu

okrenutom ka Tihom okeanu.

facing the Pacific Ocean.

Na ovom mestu, zabeležili smo novu vrstu mikroalge

In this place, we reported a new type of microalgae

that grew only on top of the spiderwebs that covered the cave entrance.

koja je rasla samo na vrhu paukovih mreža koje pokrivaju ulaz u pećinu.

Have you ever seen a spiderweb early in the morning?

Da li ste ikada videli paukovu mrežu rano ujutro?

It's covered with dew,

Prekrivena je rosom,

so this microalgae learned that in order to carry photosynthesis

tako da su ove mikroalge naučile da, ako žele da obavljaju fotosintezu

na obali najsuvlje pustinje na Zemlji,

in the coast of the driest desert on Earth,

mogu da koriste paukove mreže.

they could use the spiderwebs.

So here they may access the water from the fogs

Ovde mogu da koriste vodu iz magle

koja redovno prekriva ove oblasti ujutru.

that regularly cover these areas in the morning.

In another cave, we found a different type of microalgae.

U drugoj pećini smo pronašli drugačiju vrstu mikroalgi.

Ova može da koristi izmaglicu sa okeana kao izvor vode

This one is able to use ocean mist as a source of water,

and strikingly lives in the very bottom of a cave,

i, iznenađujuće, živi na samom dnu pećine,

so it has adapted to live with less than 0.1 percent

tako da se prilagodila da živi sa manje od 0,1 posto

of the amount of light that regular plants need.

od količine svetlosti koja je potrebna običnim biljkama.

Ove vrste zaključaka mi govore

These type of findings suggest to me that on Mars,

da na Marsu možda možemo naći čak i fotosintetski život u pećinama.

we may find even photosynthetic life inside caves.

And by the way, that's me.

Inače, ovo sam ja.

(Laughter)

(Smeh)

Skoro 15 godina za ovu oblast Đangaja, koju je otkrila Nasa,

Now, for almost 15 years this region of Yungay, discovered by NASA,

was thought to be the driest place of this desert,

se mislilo da je najsuvlje mesto ove pustinje,

but I knew that it was not.

ali ja sam znao da nije.

How? You already know the answer.

Kako? Već znate odgovor.

Zato što sam rođen i odrastao u ovoj pustinji,

Because I was born and raised in this desert.

So I remembered that I usually see fogs in Yungay,

tako da sam se setio da obično viđam maglu u Đangaju.

Nakon postavljanja senzora na više mesta

so after setting sensors in a number of places,

where I remember never seeing fogs or clouds,

gde se sećam da nikada nisam video maglu ili oblake,

I reported four other sites much drier than Yungay,

prijavio sam četiri druga mesta mnogo suvlja od Đangaja,

with this one, María Elena South,

uključujući i ovo, Marija Elena južna,

koje je istinski najsuvlje mesto na Zemlji;

being the truly driest place on Earth,

as dry as Mars,

podjednako suvo kao i Mars

and amazingly, just a 15-minute ride

i, iznenađujuće, samo na 15 minuta vožnje

from the small mining town where I was born.

od malog rudarskog mesta gde sam ja rođen.

U ovom istraživanju pokušavali smo, u stvari, da nađemo granicu suvoće

Now, in this search, we were trying to actually find the dry limit

for life on Earth,

za život na Zemlji -

a place so dry that nothing was able to survive in it.

mesto toliko suvo da ništa ne može da opstane u njemu.

But even here, well hidden underground,

Ali, čak i ovde, dobro sakriveno ispod zemlje,

našli smo određeni broj različitih mikroorganizama,

we found a number of different microorganisms,

which suggested to me that similarly dry places, like Mars,

što meni ukazuje da slična suva mesta, kao Mars,

mogu biti nastanjena.

may be inhabited.

We even have some preliminary evidences

Čak imamo neke preliminarne dokaze

that these microorganisms may still be active

da ovi mikroorganizmi mogu i dalje biti aktivni

u osušenom stanju,

in the desiccated state,

kao mumije koje šetaju svuda oko nas,

like walking mummies all around us,

i da možda koriste ultraljubičasto zračenje kao izvor energije.

and that they may be using UV radiation as a source of energy.

If confirmed, this would have a huge impact on our definition of life,

Ako se ovo potvrdi, imaće ogroman uticaj na našu definiciju života,

on how we look for life elsewhere in the universe.

na to kako tražimo život drugde u svemiru.

Due to its clear skies, by 2020,

Zbog svog vedrog neba, do 2020. godine,

60 percent of the biggest telescopes on Earth

60 posto najvećih teleskopa na Zemlji

will be located in the Atacama,

će se nalaziti u Atakami,

and while everyone else will be looking among the stars

i dok će svi ostali gledati među zvezde

to answer the question, "Are we alone?"

da odgovore na pitanje: „Da li smo sami?“,

I will be looking down to the ground

ja ću gledati dole u zemlju

searching for this same answer

tražeći isti odgovor

in my own backyard.

u svom dvorištu.

Thank you.

Hvala.

(Applause)

(Aplauz)