Has NASA Found Alien Life?????

[snowdogged]

NASA is going have a press conference this evening and there is some speculation that they may have found some alien life form. We will see what it is tonight. It is supposedly some type of bacteria that thrives on arsenic. This is like one of those sci-fi/horror movies where someone gets infected with this stuff and starts infecting others and everyone starts to mutate into monsters.

 

Link to story

[librarian]

It's those squids again...

[sullysue]

According to that story, it's not a new alien life form, per se. But, the behavior of this bacteria and how they have been trained to survive opens up the possibility that life can exist outside the conditions science once thought were necessary. I don't think we need to worry about a mass invasion from outer space quite yet.

[snowdogged]

[treeduck]

It's only gonna be spores or something...nothing too interesting...

 

Wait a minute

 

[CMWriter]

Yay, alien bacteria. /sarcasm

 

Okay, to be honest, that would be pretty cool.. But aside from maybe the medical and biological world, it's not civilization-changing. So while I think it's interesting it probably won't be ground-breaking news.

 

But yay NASA nonetheless. They don't get enough love (or money).

[theredtamasrule]

It's really cool and amazing that this hasn't been discovered until now. It also makes sense and I thought we'd already discovered bacteria in the ocean floor that lived in life-hostile environments around hot sulfur vents?

 

Nontheless this is cool.

[snowdogged]

NASA seems to be discovering a lot of stuff the last few months. Maybe they are just making this stuff up so they can get more money.

[micgtr71]

QUOTE (snowdogged @ Dec 2 2010, 07:49 PM)

NASA seems to be discovering a lot of stuff the last few months. Maybe they are just making this stuff up so they can get more money.

You know, this thought has crossed my mind.

[rushgoober]

I knew this announcement would be pretty lame, but it was even lamer than that.

 

Seriously though, if Nasa had discovered some kind of alien life, I doubt they would announce a press conference and keep people hanging in that kind of goofy way they did.

 

Then again, I doubt they would reveal a finding like that at all.

[J2112YYZ]

QUOTE (theredtamasrule @ Dec 2 2010, 05:09 PM)

It's really cool and amazing that this hasn't been discovered until now.

Considering we have a space program that was never able to get past sending man to the moon 41 years ago, i'm not shocked it took this long for them to discover something this insignificant. Seriously, at this point we should be beyond finding bacteria on other planets and finding by now.

 

I'm not interested unless they can find some sort of intelligent being and tell us "here is undeniable proof of an alien".

[CMWriter]

Well.. the announcement might seem insignificant, but if it has some kind of energy or medical or whatever possibilities, then I'm all for that.

To be honest, I'm more concerned about finals than NASA's latest discovery. If they found aliens I'd probably be like, "Um, that's great, I gotta go study my Spanish and Trig' now, 'kay 'bye."

I think we have big enough issues on our own planet as is.

 

[treeduck]

QUOTE (rushgoober @ Dec 3 2010, 08:45 AM)

I knew this announcement would be pretty lame, but it was even lamer than that. Seriously though, if Nasa had discovered some kind of alien life, I doubt they would announce a press conference and keep people hanging in that kind of goofy way they did. Then again, I doubt they would reveal a finding like that at all.

Rushgoober is the secret alien life that NASA has been testing all these 70 years (though they tell him it's only about 40 ) disguised as a hippy in Oregon...

 

[Cowtothesky]

QUOTE (J2112YYZ @ Dec 3 2010, 12:14 PM)

QUOTE (theredtamasrule @ Dec 2 2010, 05:09 PM) It's really cool and amazing that this hasn't been discovered until now. Considering we have a space program that was never able to get past sending man to the moon 41 years ago, i'm not shocked it took this long for them to discover something this insignificant. Seriously, at this point we should be beyond finding bacteria on other planets and finding by now.   I'm not interested unless they can find some sort of intelligent being and tell us "here is undeniable proof of an alien". We did get Tang, though.

[JohnnyBlaze]

QUOTE (J2112YYZ @ Dec 4 2010, 02:14 AM)

QUOTE (theredtamasrule @ Dec 2 2010, 05:09 PM) It's really cool and amazing that this hasn't been discovered until now. Considering we have a space program that was never able to get past sending man to the moon 41 years ago, i'm not shocked it took this long for them to discover something this insignificant. Seriously, at this point we should be beyond finding bacteria on other planets and finding by now.   I'm not interested unless they can find some sort of intelligent being and tell us "here is undeniable proof of an alien". Hell, it's not like flying to the moon is a 2 buck bus fare. And it's not like it's as easy as breathing.   I blame Hollywood for your EXTREMELY high expectations....i.e. 40 years ago we were walking on the moon and by now we should've been talking to Spock or Predator?! Seriously, come on.

[JohnnyBlaze]

QUOTE (treeduck @ Dec 4 2010, 06:55 AM)

QUOTE (rushgoober @ Dec 3 2010, 08:45 AM) I knew this announcement would be pretty lame, but it was even lamer than that. Seriously though, if Nasa had discovered some kind of alien life, I doubt they would announce a press conference and keep people hanging in that kind of goofy way they did. Then again, I doubt they would reveal a finding like that at all. Rushgoober is the secret alien life that NASA has been testing all these 70 years (though they tell him it's only about 40 ) disguised as a hippy in Oregon...   Unsurprisingly, I thought something very similar. Although I didn't think "hippy in Oregon". I was thinking disguised as a "sick and twisted f**k"

[treeduck]

QUOTE (JohnnyBlaze @ Dec 5 2010, 01:58 AM)

QUOTE (treeduck @ Dec 4 2010, 06:55 AM) QUOTE (rushgoober @ Dec 3 2010, 08:45 AM) I knew this announcement would be pretty lame, but it was even lamer than that. Seriously though, if Nasa had discovered some kind of alien life, I doubt they would announce a press conference and keep people hanging in that kind of goofy way they did. Then again, I doubt they would reveal a finding like that at all. Rushgoober is the secret alien life that NASA has been testing all these 70 years (though they tell him it's only about 40 ) disguised as a hippy in Oregon...   Unsurprisingly, I thought something very similar. Although I didn't think "hippy in Oregon". I was thinking disguised as a "sick and twisted f**k" Well maybe a sick, twisted, hippy f**k out of oregon??

[Ultra]

First off, I haven't read anywhere in this news article, nor in the abstract of the paper the article itself references, to make any such claim that the bacterial life they found is alien life. The paper merely suggests that they have identified a species of bacteria that can live in an environment rich in arsenic, a known toxin with similar characteristics to phosphorus. Other than the fact that NASA is associated with this finding, I don't know how the idea that alien life had been discovered came about.

 

Secondly, the paper has not been released aside from the abstract. There are some pretty lofty claims that the discovered bacteria incorperates arsenic into its DNA, which seems like an interesting concept given the similarities between phosphorus and arsenic. However, until the full paper is released with concrete evidence demonstrating that arsenic is present in the bacterial DNA structure, these are merely claims and not proven.

 

Third, this form of bacteria had already been discovered 6 years ago. The 2004 paper, The microbial arsenic cycle in Mono Lake, California, describes the finding of these bacteria well before NASA's claim.

[snowdogged]

[Ultra]

My big beef with the article was with their claim that the bacteria incorperated arsenic into its DNA, as well as into many other molecules of the cell including ATP (the main energy source for cells) and phospholipids that compose cellular membranes.

 

I still have not yet read the article, but from how a professor from the University of British Columbia describes the findings in her blog, I am increasingly skeptical that these bacteria are able utilize arsenic in the way the authors claim. She rails into the authors for not providing enough controls for much of their data and faults them for the samples they used to test.