Nasa heads to Scottish Highlands in its search for life on Mars

Nasa scientists are studying rocks in the Scottish Highlands to help them understand if there was once life on Mars.

The US space agency announced last year that its Perseverance rover had found potential biosignatures , markings on rocks possibly made by ancient microbes.

This summer, scientists took samples from a geological feature called the Stoer Formation , external around Clachtoll, in Assynt, in the north-west Highlands.

Nasa said the area's rocks formed in environments comparable to ancient Martian lakes and rivers, but could also hold evidence of microbial life from 1.2 billion years ago.

Clachtoll is a small crofting community on the Sutherland coast about 100 miles north of Inverness, and is a popular destination along the North Coast 500 tourist route.

Nasa's Goddard Instrument Field Team, which specialises in studying Earth's extreme environments, led the research expedition.

Experts from the universities of Glasgow and Cambridge were among those involved.

They took rock samples from cliffs for further analysis.

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