Inhibiting star formation, how Earth and Mars formed and this world’s cold-loving organisms

Welcome! “Alien Life” tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. You may notice that this and future entries are shorter than usual; career, family and book deal commitments have forced me to cut back some of my projects. Now, here’s today’s news:
g Stars - A SRON astronomer is the first to have observed acidic particulate clouds outside of our own Milky Way galaxy. Astronomers think that acidification inhibits the formation of stars and planets in the dust clouds. See article.
g Abodes - A team of scientists has found that terrestrial planets such as the Earth and Mars may have remained molten in their early histories for tens of millions of years. The findings indicate that the two planets cooled slower than scientists thought and a mechanism to keep the planet interiors warm is required. See article.
g Life - Molecular evolutionist Mitch Sogin argues that if we want to learn how to look for life on other worlds in our solar system, we should study cold-loving organisms on Earth. See article. Note: This article is from 2005.
g Cosmicus - Until space tourism becomes a substantial business space activities, including particularly all crewed space activities, will remain a burden on taxpayers. But some argue that no activity other than tourism offers similar promise of turning space activities into profitable commercial activities in the foreseeable future. See article.