FAREWELL TO A GREAT SCIENTIST AND FELLOW ASTROENVIRONMENTALIST
DR. GILBERT V. LEVIN (April 24, 1924-July 26, 2021)
It is with great sadness that on July 26, 2021, Gilbert
Victor Levin, NASA Viking Lander 1 and 2 astrobiologist and ICAMSR Scientific
Advisor, passed away at the age of 97. Dr. Levin was in good health until Saturday morning
July 24th when according to his son Ron Levin, he suffered a dissection in his
aorta. He never regained consciousness.
I first interviewed Gil for Final Frontier magazine back in
1993. That interview was a revelation to me because NASA had kept his work so
quiet and in the background. From here I studied all the Viking scientific
reports and then came to the same realization he did - that he and Dr. Patricia
Ann discovered strong evidence for microbial metabolism coming out of the Martian
soil in samples they obtained using the Viking Lander robotic arm and then examined
in Dr. Levin's instrument called he the Labeled Release experiment which was
placed on both Viking Landers. Oddly, NASA never followed up on the greater meaning
of their discovery and no other extant life detection instruments have been sent to
Mars in the intervening 45 years since Viking. Because of the significance and the
gravity of their experiments on the surface of Mars it led me to write my 1997
book MARS THE LIVING PLANET in which Gil first rendered his conclusion that it could
only be indigenous microbial life from Mars causing his experiments to react the
way they were. And in 2010 I wrote the book - THE MICROBES OF MARS, an addendum
to MARS THE LIVIING PLANET.
I was always impressed with Gil's integrity as a scientist
and I do feel strongly that all the Mars spacecraft data gleaned over the years
that I have been able to study point to his conclusion that Microbial life
exists in some form just under the Martian soil. Gil and Pat felt strongly that
the astrobiology community demand that a series of life detection instruments
be sent to the surface of Mars before any attempts to return Martian soil and
rock samples are brought directly to Earth. Both Gil and Pat thought this step
was necessary to protect Earth's biosphere from any harmful back contamination
from Mars. This inspired the creation of ICAMSR and both Gil and Pat agreed to
become scientific advisors and consultants. It was Gil Levin who as my mentor, that
I went from being a science writer and investigator to my becoming an
astrobiologist myself working with both Cardiff University in Wales and later with
my Fellowship at Buckingham University in the UK. All of my work on rock
varnish, the work on biogenic dissolution cavities and with my latest book
DISCOVERY ON VERA RUBIN RIDGE: TRACE FOSSILS ON MARS all directly or indirectly
support his Viking Labeled Release experiment conclusions.
Having lost Gil and Patricia Ann Straat as a scientific advisors the
International Committee Against Mars Sample Return (www.icamsr.org)
is proud to announce that Gilbert's son, Dr. Ron L. Levin will take his father's
place as an ICAMSR science advisor and consultant. Dr. Ron Levin has a Ph.D.
from Johns Hopkins University and is currently an Engineering Fellow at
Raytheon in El Segundo, California where he works on signal processing
software. During the NASA Viking Lander missions Ron spent the summer of 1976
with his father Gilbert at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena,
California where he witnessed many of the important moments of the Viking
Mission. Ron has traveled to twenty Mars science conferences in support of
his father Gilbert's astrobiology work and often built PowerPoint presentations
for him as well as providing few talks about life on Mars of his own.
Above: The late Dr. Patricia Ann Straat stands next to Dr. Ron Levin at the 2020
Viking 40th Anniversary Symposium held at the NASA Langley Research
Center in Hampton, Virginia.
Barry E. DiGregorio - Director for ICAMSR (www.icamsr.org)
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