I'm ignorant on this.
Say we send humans or a probe to Mars, how would they confidently conclude something under a microscope wasn't brought by humans unless it's like super foreign/alien/obvious?
Say we send humans or a probe to Mars, how would they confidently conclude something under a microscope wasn't brought by humans unless it's like super foreign/alien/obvious?
https://store.nanoporetech.com/us/configure-minion-enhanced/
(This strategy works until a human arrives. Once humans are there, we'll be bringing with us all of our microbiotic friends.)
In all seriousness, I know this was in jest, but I think this is actually still on topic and applies to the bigger discussion of our mission in finding and understanding what the heck life really is. So upvote.
That's assuming that we are not contrained by mass or volume on the mission which seems reasonable with a SpaceX Starship-style mission because if we were then we shouldn't be sending humans at all imo.