In a press conference held today (Dec. 2), scientists working with NASA announced the discovery of a new microorganism right here on Earth, that employs a survival strategy never seen before in any other life form. Found in Northern California’s highly-saline Mono Lake, the GFAJ-1 bacteria exists in an environment that has very little phosphorous, an element that had previously been considered essential for all living things in order to build DNA. To cope with this problem, the bacteria is able to substitute highly-toxic arsenic for phosphorous, in its cell components. The fact that a microbe is able to survive in such a fashion opens up the possibilities for where life could exist on other planets, and will require a rethink on NASA’s part regarding its search for extraterrestrial life forms.
This is a follow-up to the previous post.
Archive for grandkids.
I once read that life could arise any place there is a high enough energy gradient. Be that thermal, electromagnetic or what not. Sort of like a Murphy’s Law of Biology. If like can exist life will exist.
Damn it!
Somewhere, there’s probably life based on silicon or some element other than carbon.
Mono Lake is where the movie High Plains Drifter was filmed.
The Outer Limits documentary “The Galaxy Being” in 1963 covered a nitrogen cycle humanoid life form that was accidentally transmitted to earth. For political and sociological reasons this entity did not survive long in our atmosphere. But clearly, alternate types of extraterrestrial life, advanced life, have been about known for decades.
Probably just Bobo’s sperm donation that got misplaced.
I’ve read that “energy gradient” thing as well. Makes sense to me-things have to “move” to be alive and that takes a gradient.
With no knowledge at all, I assume that the dna coding of life/proteins can be duplicated in various different ways depending on what the environment provides? Even non-carbon crystals can grow and become “more numerous” but they are not defined as life.
the idea that life may exist out there is completely uninteresting to me. How about “intelligent life?” That would be interesting to discover wherever it is.
Wake me up when they start eating people.
There are 5,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 bacteria in the world. (Seriously, somebody estimated it!).
I’m guessing this isn’t that last freaky ones they will find.
So scientist don’t know it all, as many of them would like you to believe. I wonder what the next fundamental error will be.
–not to diminish the ramifications of microbes re-programming their ATP, DNA and cell membranes to sub arsenic for phosphorus..
whats sucks about this is that all the news & magazine press releases massaged the released as a new discovery..when it was not a “discovery” at all.. it was an intentional NASA test using the lake bed as the “lab”
-when they eventually deprived the microbes of all the phosphorus, they adapted and plugged in the arsenic in its place.
often, we are led to believe that something like this is supposed to millions of years. -apparently that idea is BULLCHIT. 🙂
my 2¢
-s
If you knew how poorly paid and illequipped NASA scientists are nowadays, you would realise how resourceful and efficient they are to be able to do any thing even vaguely related to research.
I for one welcome our new living poison overlords
#10 richard
Felisa Wolfe-Simon is the Astrobiology/Exobiology scientist at NASA behind this research. She did a double degree program in Biology/Chemistry and Oboe Performance at Oberlin and graduated with two degrees. Did her PhD at Rutgers. Has a nose ring. Plays bass in rock band. And occasionally has pink hair.
No wonder you feel fucking inadequate around science types.