A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the news (in The Alchemist on ChemWeb.com) that NASA scientists had announced evidence of life on Mars. Thence followed withdrawals, denials, and retribution. Apparently, the announcement was pre-emptive of a paper in Nature and the scientists and NASA having realised their faux pas, allegedly then claimed not to have staked a claim for life on Mars after all. space.com who made the original announcement then published a follow-up that effectively retracted the claim. Meanwhile, the European Space Agency has been making its own proclamations: ESA – Science – Chances of life are linked to water and the media is full of it. Could it be that the publishers of Nature were simply trying to keep editorial control of such earth (or should that be mars) shattering results. It’s pretty unlikely, but the truth will likely emerge in the next week or so, as the pressure builds…