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According to a scientist NASA may have killed living creatures on Mars accidentally while carrying out a research mission to find them on the Red Planet. 

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Scientists, for decades, have been making efforts to find any signs of life on the planet, however, no conclusive evidence has emerged as of yet. 

Astrobiologist Dirk Schulze-Makuch, who is from the Technical University Berlin in Germany, said that Viking landers emerged as the first US mission which landed safely on Mars in 1976 which probably was the closest scientists came to finding alien life, reported Science Alert.

How Viking landers may have ended up killing lives on Mars?

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The scientist said that the methods of finding life are destructive in themselves. He shared his thoughts in a column shared in Big Think and in commentary which was published in Nature Astronomy. 

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"The Viking landers identified small amounts of chlorinated organics, initially believed to be contamination from Earth," said Schulze-Makuch.

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"However, subsequent missions have verified the presence of native organic compounds on Mars, although in a chlorinated form. Life on Mars could have adapted to the arid environment by existing within salt rocks and absorbing water directly from the atmosphere," he added.

"The Viking experiments, which involved adding water to soil samples, might have overwhelmed these potential microbes, leading to their demise," he further stated. 

Microbes 'overwhelmed' on the Red Planet?

Schulze-Makuch further said that the planet's potential microbes may have been "overwhelmed".

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"Microbes living inside salt rocks in the Atacama do not need any rain at all - just a certain amount of moisture in the atmosphere," he added. 

"Now let's ask what would happen if you poured water over these dry-adapted microbes. Might that overwhelm them? In technical terms, we would say that we were hyperhydrating them, but in simple terms, it would be more like drowning them. Many of the Viking experiments involved applying water to the soil samples, which may explain the puzzling results," the scientist further explained.

Schulze-Makuch has advised to send another mission to the Red Planet in search of life. 

(With inputs from agencies)