We could be closer to establishing the premises of life on the Red Planet than ever before. Mars is in many aspects very similar to Earth, scientists in charge of the Phoenix mission revealed, and the alkaline, full of minerals Martian soil has great chances to support microbial life.

The Phoenix mission took one major step on Wednesday, when it gave the scientific community something to dream about. The Mars Lander experimented with its first wet Martian soil sample, returning data that gives great hope for proving life on Mars is not wishful thinking.

Michael Hecht from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, lead scientist for the Microscopy, Electrochemistry and Conductivity Analyzer (MECA) instrument of Phoenix, said they now have to work on better understanding the chemistry of the wet soil, and determine whether its components might be able to support life.

The first of the two-day wet chemistry experiment is now 80 percent complete, NASA unveiled, adding that there Phoenix has three more wet-chemistry cells to be used later in the mission.

The good news about the first soil samples were probably the best news sent from the Red Planet to this date: the analyzed soil resembles with the upper dry soils in Antarctica.

Sam Kouvanes of the Tufts University, Phoenix co-investigator and project leader for the wet chemistry investigation, explained that the one-inch into the surface layer the soil is very basic, with a pH of between eight and nine.

In addition to that, the soil also presents a series of salt components, which haven’t been fully analyzed yet. Among them, traces of magnesium, sodium, potassium and chloride have been identified.

Scientists also hope to identify nitrogen and sulfates, whose presence would create the necessary conditions for life to exist beneath the Martian surface.

The alkaline soil, which surprised scientists, is somewhat similar to what you may find in your backyard. “You might be able to grow asparagus in it, but probably not strawberries,” Sam Kounaves said.

The soil components identified so far not only support the evidence of water, but also come to support the life on Mars theory. As Kounaves pointed out, Mars is not an alien world like everyone says, but rather something in many aspects very similar to Earth.

With the help of the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer (TEGA), which baked the first soil sample at 1,000 degrees Celsius (1,800 degrees Fahrenheit), scientists also received amazing results, despite the fact that the analysis is a weeks-long process and hasn’t ended yet.

So far, scientists can say for certain that the Martian soil clearly interacted with water in the past, whether in the area of study (the northern polar region) or in regions elsewhere.

In addition to the baked and wet soil samples, the Phoenix Lander also collected data on clouds, dust, winds, temperatures and pressures in the atmosphere while trying to obtain more information on the atmospheric processes in the Martian arctic region.

Phoenix’s mission was set to stretch over 90 Martian days, or 92 Earth days in the north region of the planet, at temperatures of minus 73 C to minus 33 C (minus 100 F to minus 28 F).

The mission was thought to be very challenging, but full of hope at the same time, as everyone expects the Lander to confirm the pro-Martian life theories and infirm the pessimistic theories according to which life on Mars has only a “ghost of a chance.”