[meteorite-list] pollution

From: MarkF <mafer_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Mon Jul 18 20:00:19 2005
Message-ID: <009201c58bf4$da5f0ab0$01fea8c0_at_MAF>

Hi Al and List

This has been a good topic, but one thing I think is novel is that the
current rash of insidious killing "bugs" we have going on (aids and mad cow
and now white tail deer wasting disease) all seem to be some little bug they
can't see under a magnifier. So, they name them preons I think, not quite a
virus or bacterium and more than a glob of molecules maybe.
I'm not a microbiologist, nor am I a chemist, and I'm bearly a geologist,
but I do know that there are some sturdy little bugs in the world and many
have a tougher hide than anything we ever dreamed of. There are bugs that
eat minerals and leave lethal doses of cyanide and pure gold as a waste
products for us to find. They live on hydrogen sulfides in total darkness
and extreme heat.

So, traveling in a rock would be a cake walk for some bugs with no genitic
material to worry about being mutated by energetic ions during a
multi-million year ride to a little dustball with lots of salty water on it.
Those that did have genetic material would just take it in stride and the
fittest would survive.

But, if we can't find some forms of quasi-life here on earth, how could we
hope to find it on another planet?
Any of the Martian rocks could carry a proto-virus and we'd be hard pressed
to detect it. And what if some of the more interesting and less definable
meteorites we do have are a piece of say, Europa or Io, no telling what
proto lifeforms could develope in the strange makeup of those moons.

This is the stuff of great sci-fi novels and xenobiologist nightmares! Did I
read a question about meteorites that dissolve in water? Maybe that isn't so
far fetched an idea if you think about planetismals/moons like Europa or Io.

Anyway, this has been a great off topic talk.

Mark F, lost somewhere where the big thing on Friday nights is learning to
dip a little snuff...


----- Original Message -----
From: "AL Mitterling" <almitt_at_kconline.com>
To: "Dave Harris" <entropydave_at_ntlworld.com>
Cc: <acculabs_at_hotmail.com>; "metlist" <meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Monday, July 18, 2005 7:24 PM
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] pollution


> Hi Dave and all,
>
> I think what your concern is (tell me if I am wrong), not so much
> transporting biological organisms but rather contamination of the planet
> then later finding that contamination and declaring there is life there on
> the red rock.
>
> As I recall there was great concern when we were first going there about
> this and the Russians and the American space programs agreed to be as
> careful, sterile as we could be so if there was life on Mars, it wouldn't
> be from transported microbes.
>
> Your question is of course a very good one. Perhaps you are asking the
> wrong division of Nasa. An email to the various science investigating
> teams might be in order. BTW this is very on topic as it deals with a
> question about life in meteorites (or planets) in which we have space
> rocks that have landed.
>
> --AL
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Received on Mon 18 Jul 2005 08:00:19 PM PDT