By Marc Arcas
Washington, April 12 (EFE/IANS): NASA scientists are now convinced that extraterrestrial life is a fact, not a mere possibility, and say man will find conclusive signs of life far from the Earth by the year 2045.
For scientists, the big question about alien life is no longer if it will be found but when.
"I think we're going to have strong indications of life beyond Earth within a decade, and I think we're going to have definitive evidence within 20 to 30 years," NASA chief scientist Ellen Stofan said this week during a forum on habitable places in space.
"We know where to look. We know how to look. In most cases we have the technology, and we're on a path to implementing it. And so I think we're definitely on the road," said an optimistic Stofan.
She cautioned, however, that "we are not talking about little green men -- we are talking about little microbes".
The scientific community has spent years looking for extraterrestrial life, and the most recent finds suggest that several planets near Earth and their respective moons could have the necessary conditions to support some kind of life.
Even in our own solar system, astronomers believe there could be an ocean on Enceladus, one of Saturn's sixty moons, while on Ganymede, Jupiter's famous moon, there is definitely a salt-water ocean. Both orbiters are considered to have what it takes for life to exist.
Another of the more promising places, according to NASA, is Europa, Jupiter's frozen moon that also has its own ocean, one that experts say has all the ingredients needed to foster life.
"I think we're one generation away in our solar system, whether it's on an icy moon or on Mars, and one generation (away) on a planet around a nearby star," said former astronaut and associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, John Grunsfeld.
While the debate on whether alien life exists seems a thing of the past, the questions scientists now ask go a little further: What does extraterrestrial life look like, how will it be found and how will we recognise it?
Stofan, who besides being an astronomer is a geologist, gives her answer: "I have a bias that it's eventually going to take humans on the surface of Mars -- field geologists, astrobiologists, chemists -- actually out there looking for that good evidence of life that we can bring back to Earth for all the scientists to argue about."