NASA is holding a news media teleconference at 11 am PDT, Tues, Aug. 5 to discuss recent scientific findings of the Phoenix Mars Lander. [right, NASA/JPL-CalTech/Univ. Arizona]
According to principal investigator Peter Smith of the Univ. of Arizona, ""We are committed to following a rigorous scientific process. While we have not completed our process on these soil samples, we have very interesting intermediate results. Initial MECA [a wet chemistry lab] analyses suggested Earth-like soil. Further analysis has revealed un-Earthlike aspects of the soil chemistry."