10 Places Most Likely To Harbour Alien Life

The search for life in the universe is not just limited to planets and moons and there have been over 22,000 meteorite discoveries over the years that are thought to have the potential to harbour life.

This isn't to say that there is a little race of meteor people building houses on their rocky hosts, but there is evidence to suggest that many meteors contain the organic compounds needed to form the building blocks of life.

If this is true then it lends credence to the astrobiological theory of "panspermia" (literally meaning "seeds everywhere"). This theory hypothesises that life on Earth was seeded by the organic compounds delivered by meteor impacts during the formation of the solar system, as well as the delivery of water in the form of icy meteors.

In 1996, scientists thought that they had spotted evidence of "microfossils" on a Martian meteor, perhaps showing that life could have existed on or around the red planet around 3.6 million years ago. The discovery has been the subject of fierce debate and scientists have still been unable to come up with a conclusive decision in the years since the discovery.