Wrong Way Planet

Scientists have discovered that WASP-17 is orbiting its star in the opposite direction (retrograde) of its star's spin. Most planets orbit their stars in the same direction of their star's spin. WASP-17 must have had a violent past, such as a near collision early in its life, for it to be in a retrograde orbit. Because of this violent past, it does not have a circular orbit.

This got me to wondering - if, in this possibly infinite universe, there exists a life harboring planet that orbits its star in the wrong direction, and by an extremely rare stroke of luck, orbits its star in a nearly circular orbit (eccentric orbits are not as conducive to life). Would the sentient species that arises, seeing that their planet orbits in the opposite direction from all the other planets in their star system (and later, they discover, around other star systems as well), think that this is a sign that they are special above all others? When they later find life on other planets, and find that those planets orbit with their star, would they think them inferior, or infidels?

Of course maybe they would reason differently than humans. Maybe they would think the opposite. Or have little emotions and thus not really moved one way or the other, other than curiosity as to why their planet is different.

By they way, the planet gets its name for the SuperWASP (Wide Angle Search for Planets) program, not because it is a planet inhabited by hymenopterans, or by white Anglo-Saxon protestants...


References

Alexander, Amir. "Scientists Detect 'Wrong-Way' Planet." Planetary News. The Planetary Society. 12 Aug. 2009. Web. 31 Aug. 2009. <
http://planetary.org/news/2009/0812_Scientists_Detect_WrongWay_Planet.html>

"SuperWASP Homepage." SuperWASP - Wide Angle Search for Planets. 3 June 2009. Web 31 Aug. 2009. <http://www.superwasp.org/>


Image credit: ESA/C. Carreau

The Sun's Twin? (and does that mean another Earth as well?)

Another Sol?

An article by Bob Berman in this month's (Oct 2009) issue of Astronomy mentions that

of the 1,000 nearest stars within 3 dozen light-years, only one matches our Sun's temperature, size, and luminosity and has the same precise spectral class of G2V (a main sequence star with a surface temperature of about 9980 degrees Fahrenheit...).

In addition, that twin star is similar in age, though a bit older: the Sun is 4.6 billion years old, while this twin star is 5 to 6 billion years old.

One in a Thousand

That twin star? Alpha Centauri A. As Bob Berman points out - of all those 1,000 stars the only one that is the Sun's close twin is also the nearest naked-eye star (4.35 light-years away). An amazing coincidence. 

Hopefully the new generation telescopes, especially the whose main tasks are to search for exoplanets, will aim their sights on the Centauri trinary system. It would almost be criminal not to take a closer look. If there is a terrestrial planet circling Alpha Centauri A, the new generation telescopes should be able to find it. With Alpha Centauri A a bit older than the Sun, unless life evolved on Earth quicker than usual, a terrestrial planet in a habitable zone around Alpha Centauri A would have had plenty of time for sentient life to arise.

Long Distance Relationship

Of course, maybe sentient life does not survive its early years of sentience and there is no longer any sentient life to discover... But let us be optimistic for a moment and say that it survives. 4.35 light-years away would allow for communication via radio waves or laser. Sure, it would take 8.7 years for each message to be answered (4.35 years for it to travel there, and 4.35 years for the answer to travel back), but it still could be done.

But should we try to communicate with them? The wonders are tempting, but there is the possibility of danger...


References

"Alpha Centauri - A Candidate for Terrestrial Planets And Intelligent Life." Smoot Group Cosmology. The Smoot Group. 15 Oct. 1997. Web. 30 Aug. 2009. <http://aether.lbl.gov/www/classes/p139/speed/Alpha-Centauri.html>

Berman, Bob. "A dozen cool facts." Strange Universe. Astronomy. Oct 2009: 16. Print.


Image Credit: The Smoot Group.

Life from Clay

© Animation Factory

The Two Faces of RNA

Scientists at Howard Hughes Medical Institute are closing in on how life arose from inorganic material. RNA was first thought to be essentially a way of storing the genetic information need to build proteins. But Tom Cech and Sidney Altman discovered in  the 1980s that RNA can catalyze cellular chemical reactions. This led some scientist to speculate that RNA may have come before DNA. RNA may be one of the "missing-links" in the evolution of DNA from simple chemicals.

Life from Clay

Dr. Jack W. Szostak  and his team looked at montmorillonite, a clay mixture that existed in the early Earth, and discovered that it helped

1. the formation of vesicles (a small fluid filled sac) formed from fatty acids,
   
2. the formation of RNA, and
   
3. RNA to move into the vesicles (the RNA stuck to the clay and "rode" it into the vesicles.

The result is a cell-like structure.

So, the creation myths that involve life being formed from clay may be on to something after all.

Universal Biology

The above chemical processes ended up creating a cell-like structure. Life is a natural result of certain chemical processes that build on each other. A watery terrestrial planet in a habitable zone will have weathering of rocks, forming clay.  If the laws of chemistry are the same throughout the universe (or even in just our galactic region), then life will arise on more than just our planet.


Reference:

 "HHMI Scientist Bio: Jack W. Szostak, Ph.D." HHMI Investigators. Scientists and Research. Howard Hughes Medical Institute. n.d. Web. 29 Aug. 2009. <http://www.hhmi.org/research/investigators/szostak_bio.html>

The Future for Some Habitable Moons

© Lynette Cook

Exchanging Rings?

I was watching BBC's 1999 miniseries The Planets (shown on the Science channel) recently; they were showing several episodes in a row.

In one episode they discussed how Saturn's rings will, eventually, vanish. But that the moon of another outer planet, Neptune, would break up from tidal forces as it slowly spirals in toward the planet, creating another planet with rings rivaling that of Saturn's lost rings. We would swap one ringed planet for another.

Yes, Neptune already has a ring system, but it is very dark - being comprised mostly of rocky debris while Saturn's bright rings are comprised mostly of ice. Neptune's moons are composed of rock and ice - a break up of, say Triton (one of three moons in the solar system with an atmosphere), would create a ring of ice around the planet, giving it a shimmering, shining ring system.

Spiraling Moons

This got me to thinking about the habitable moon discussions. Tidal forces are what help heat the moons (if Europa has liquid water under its icy surface, for instance, it will be the result of tidal forces). The very tidal forces that would allow for the possibility of life, which would allow for a moon to be habitable, may also signal its early demise - if the moon is slowly spiraling in.

So, for some habitable moons, their lifespans may be shorter than those of habitable planets. Which has a bearing on the rise of high order sentient life. High order sentient life probably needs a very long time to arise. Imagine being an alien race finally creating technology and exploring their solar system, only to find that their world will die long before their sun will.

Of course the flip side of the coin is shown by our moon. The Moon is slowly spiraling away from the Earth (at 3.8 centimeters, or about 2.5 inches, per year). However, while in 500 million years or so there won't be any full eclipses anymore, we won't lose the moon. Eventually the Moon and the Earth will become gravitationally locked together. At some point the Earth and Moon will become locked - the same side of the Earth will always face the same side of the moon. When that happens the Moon will quit spiraling away from us.

Why? It has to do with the fact that the Earth has large oceans. Right now the Earth rotates faster than the Moon revolves around it. The tidal bulge created by the Moon's gravitational pull moves ahead and actually forces the Moon to speed up a tiny bit. This causes its orbit to get larger. When the Earth and Moon are locked, the tidal bulge won't move faster than the Moon. High tide will be permanent in some areas, and low tide permanent in others.

"Thetis Moon" © DigitalBlasphemy.com

I still believe that we may find more habitable moons than habitable planets. But that some moons may spiral into toward their planet billions of years before their system's sun(s) die, will be one reason why it may be harder for high order sentient life to arise on some moons.

References

Cain, Fraser. "Ep. 17: Where Does the Moon Come From?" Astronomy Cast. 1 Jan. 2007. Web. 24 Aug. 2009. <http://www.astronomycast.com/solar-system/episode-17-where-does-the-moon-come-from/>

Mihos, Chris. "Neptune's Moons." Journey Through the Galaxy. Astronomy Dept. Case Western Reserve University. 13 Sept. 2006. Web. 24 Aug. 2009. <http://burro.astr.cwru.edu/stu/neptune_moons.html>

Scharringhausen, Britt. "Is the Moon moving away from the Earth? When was this discovered?" Curious About Astronomy: Ask an Astronomer. Cornell University. 21 nov. 2002. Web. 24 Aug. 2009. <http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/question.php?number=124>

The Future of Human Evolution.

I came across a Web site today which will be of some interest to those interested in speculating about alien life: The Future Human Evolution Website at <http://www.humansfuture.org/>. Yes, it is about human life and not alien life, but speculating about the future of human evolution and speculating about alien life, especially alien sentient life, overlap. If there is a Universal Biology, then examining the evolution of human life, and the future of our evolution (both natural and artificially guided) will inform our discussion and speculations on the evolution of alien sentient life.

Technology Singularity - Or, We Are Borg

The overlap is particularly salient when it comes to speculations regarding the technology singularity - when technology advances to the point that it becomes sentient. This advancement also allows sentient races who feel they have reached the limits of what biology can do for them to integrate themselves (partially or, eventually, fully) with advanced technology/machines. This is also referred to as "postbiologic." Some scientists feel this technology singularity may arrive for the human race as early as 2040, though most feel that it is more likely to be much later, the year 3000 or so.

For More Information

For more information about universal biology, visit my initial post on the topic, Universal Biologies?

For more information about postbiologic evolution or the technology singularity, visit my post Robot Aliens, The Tecnological Singularity, and Where did I leave my Borg party body?

Panspermia, Long-Lived Bacteria, and Interstellar Distances

"Dark Matter" © DigitalBlasphemy.com

I was checking out astrobiology groups on Facebook and came across a discussion on astrogensis at the "Astrobiology - Life in the Universe" Facebook group. An entry by one poster made the statement "With regards to panspermia, distances are simply too vast for living organisms to be transferred from beyond the solar system." Let's take a closer look at this problem.

The Problem

The problem stated is one of vast distances - the time for even a fast traveling extraterrestrial asteroid from even the closest star system would take an exorbitant period of time. If the average speed of an asteroid in the main belt is around 47,000 mph, and the distance to Alpha Centauri is 4.4 light-years or 25,848,247,139.8 miles (Proxima Centauri is sometimes closer, but let's go with the main star), then it would take that asteroid about 101,304 years to reach Earth.

Hardiness of Bacteria

Recently, bacteria have been found buried deep in solid rock - bacteria with very slow metabolic states and are probably thousands of years old. Penn State scientists discovered in Kalaallit Nunaat (Greenland) dormant ultra-small bacteria (Chryseobacterium greenlandensis) trapped 2 miles deep in 120,000 year old ice core samples. The scientists were able to bring them back and found it needed few nutrients to live. The scientists figure their small size helped them so survive trapped so long in the ice. Some studies indicate some bacteria can live suspended in sediments, amber, and halite for millions of years. In 2007 a group of scientists published a paper provided evidence for bacteria surviving in some frozen permafrost samples up to a half a million years. We have seen from other posts the ability for some bacteria and viruses to survive the vacuum of space. In a previous post I reported that even the small, multicellular Water Bear can survive periods in space - including normally deadly doses of ionizing radiation (Water Bears in Space!).

Illustration © European Space Organization

Spacefaring Bacteria?

With Alpha Centauri 101,304 years away (by asteroid) and bacteria that can lie dormant for at least 120,000 years (and especially those that can lie dormant for 1/2 million years), it seems that some unicellular life could theoretically make the trip. The red dwarf planetary system Gliese 581 (with one planet that is warm and terrestrial) is 20.5 light-years away, or around 471,984.5 years away at main belt asteroid velocities. Still within the range of some unicellular creatures. We have seen in earlier posts that there are scenarios where red dwarf systems can be hospitable to life.

Sol's Close Encounters

There is something else to consider as well. Our solar system is not a fixed point in the galaxy. Some researchers feel that the Sun had some close encounters with other solar systems during its 4.6 billion years of existence. The distance that a bacteria hosting extraterrestrial asteroid could have been even smaller than 4.4 light years. Some scientists feel that the Sun may have had a close encounter with another star 4 billion years ago - a very close encounter: the other star may have come as close as 14 to 19 billion miles (Neptune is 4.7 billion miles away from the Sun). That is close enough for major gravitational permutations of each solar system - including the possible exchange of an outer planet. That's right - our solar system could have, in its outermost reaches, a planet from another system left behind from this close encounter.

Let us say the other system already had life established on it. The close encounter with our Sun could cause asteroids to be jostled and sent colliding into the system's life-bearing planet, throwing up chunks of the planet into space. One of those chunks could have been captured by our solar system and eventually made it to Earth (just like some Martian "chunks" have made it to Earth, the result of some asteroid impact on the surface of Mars ejecting Martian rocks into space). Or the other system could already have asteroids with dormant unicellular life on them left over from collisions it had within itself before encountering the Sun, and one or more of those asteroids captured by our solar system.

Conclusion

In conclusion, with regards to panspermia, some stellar distances are not too vast for living organisms to be transverse and end up on Earth. Does not mean it has actually happened - the chances are still probably rather small. But the distances are not too vast, at least for stellar distances of 21 light-years or less.


References:


Coghlan, Andy. "'Resurrection Bug' Revived after 120,000 Years." Life. New Scientist. 15 June 2009. Web. 30 July 2009. <http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17305-resurrection-bug-revived-after-120000-years.html>

"Did Our Sun Capture Alien Worlds? Close Encounter May Explain Some Objects Beyond Neptune." Science News. ScienceDaily. 9 Dec. 2004. Web. 30 July 2009. <http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/12/041208235835.htm>

Jordan, Heather. "Astrogenesis Discussion Board." Astrobiology - Life in the Universe. Facebook. 26 Mar. 2008. Web. 30 July 2009. <http://www.facebook.com/s.php?init=srp&sf=r&k=200000010&n=-1&q=life%20in%20the%20universe#/topic.php?uid=19809898338&topic=8155>

Johnson, Sarah S., Martin B. Hebsgaardt, Torben R. Christensen, et. al. "Ancient Bacteria Show Evidence of DNA Repair." PNAS. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 25 July 2007. Web. 30 July 2009. <http://www.pnas.org/content/104/36/14401.full>

"Novel bacterial species found trapped in Greenland's ice." Penn State Live. Penn State University. 3 June 2008. Web. 30 July 2009. <http://live.psu.edu/story/31052>

"Telepathic" DNA

© Animation Factory

Sensing Nucleotides

As reported today at Daily Galaxy, scientists reported in the ACS’ Journal of Physical Chemistry B that DNA seems to have almost "telepathic" abilities to recognize other DNA strands that are similar to it - even when there is no physical contact and no proteins to act as messengers. Similar DNA strands seem to recognize each other and gather together. There is no known chemical explanation for it. DNA strands need to recognize similar strands as part of the replication and repair processes.

Universal Biology

The reason I find this of great interest is that it adds further support that life is a natural result of the physical (and thus chemical) laws of the universe. Amino acids, which DNA are composed of, are very common in the universe - from meteors to gas clouds. If they have some innate ability to gather together, this, I feel, helps increase the chances of life arising on more than just this planet. It makes the arising of life on Earth billions of years ago, and the evolution of that life, a little less dependent upon mere luck.


Reference:

Sato, Rebecca. "Does DNA Have 'Telepathic' Powers? - Experts Say "Yes." The Daily Galaxy. 16 July 2009. Web. 16 July 2009. <http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2009/07/does-dna-have-telepathic-properties-research-says-yes.html>