UV irradiation of biomarkers adsorbed on minerals under Martian-like conditions: Hints for life detection on Mars

We observed that degradation under Martian-like conditions occurs much slower than in terrestrial ambient conditions. The minerals labradorite and natrolite mainly promote photodegradation of nucleotides, hematite and forsterite exhibit an intermediate degrading effect, while apatite, lizardite and antigorite do not show any significant catalytic effect on the degradation of the target organic species.