Life everywhere?

[Paul Victorey]

http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science....ap/index.html

This experiment found that ~1% of normal, everyday bacteria (those normally used to surviving on the Earth's surface) can endure pressures of up to 249,000 psi (about 17,000 times greater than standard air pressure). Even after the water in the sample had crystallized to ice-6 (a very high-pressure crystalline solid) these bacteria survived for hours, and carried out cell metabolism. And these are cells which have not evolved for high pressure environments.

This discovery (quite startling, considering they were alive for hours in an environment where water cannot exist as a liquid), only serves to augment the evidence that life is quite hardy. There are bacteria known to exit under temperatures that would destroy normal cells, there are cells that have highly altered metabolisms which can exist in the deep ocean, surviving on geothermal energy.

It kind of makes you think -- as pervasive as life is within our planet, might it not be equally pervasive throughout the galaxy? Even throughout the solar system? On Earth, practically every possible source of energy that can be used by cells IS used by some form of life. This study brings forth the possibility that life could even exist on places like Mars, and that perhaps we should look in places we never thought to look before, like miles beneath the surface.

[Nuclear Krusader]

perhaps we should look in places we never thought to look before, like miles beneath the surface

Or like inside ourselves. A lot of people is continuously breathing but deep inside they're dead.

Ohh, forgive me, but life hasn't been easy on me these last days and I feel kinda depressed. Sorry.

And that fact is really interesting, thanks for sharing it with us. Every day I find something that amazes me.

[DrZaius]

Interesting stuff, thanks for the link Paul. And I agree, we've been looking for signs of life mainly on the surface, we really should be looking deeper down. All things to consider for (hopefully) a Mars mission.

[Demosthenes]

Before we send a man to Mars, I want NASA to prove that they can put a satellite in orbit first.

They lost one because they rehired the man who originally wrote many of their other modules. He wrote the code expecting it to be fully compatible with his previous work which was done in SI. We all know what happened there.

The other lander they lost because of an uninitialized boolean value which was meant to tell the lander that the legs had extended. When it tried to read this value and change it, the system stopped to contemplate why it had crashed, and then it crashed again, literally.

There are also certain spiders which will catch the breeze and actually ride the jetstreams. They essentially freeze and enter a strange cryonic state in high atmospheric conditions. Then they fall, thaw, and glide back to ground. I hate spiders to begin with and the thought that they can fly makes me even more unnerved. But, one man had it right (I forget who he is though) when he said "Perhaps the only sign of intelligent life we will ever have is their unwillingness to talk to us."

Respectfully,

Demosthenes

[troysvihl]

This study brings forth the possibility that life could even exist on places like Mars, and that perhaps we should look in places we never thought to look before, like miles beneath the surface.

I recall a study a few years back that showed core samples from more than a mile and a half down were teaming with microbial life. It surprised the heck out of the researchers because they figured that life would only extend down a few yards at the most.

[Demosthenes]

Is that the same microbe they found that essentially crapped out gold? I remember them taking a sample of dirt and found very light traces of gold or some precious metal which lead to the discover of those little critters who ate dirt ahead of them and crapped gold behind them.

Hey, if I had a choice as to what I flushed down the toilet. . .

Respectfully,

Demosthenes

[troysvihl]

lol. I don't know.