Monday, January 31, 2011

New metabolic pathway discovered and observational strategies for detecting ETI

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Abodes - The temperatures of North Atlantic Ocean water flowing north into the Arctic Ocean adjacent to Greenland -- the warmest water in at least 2,000 years - are likely related to the amplification of global warming in the Arctic, says a new international study. See article.
g Life - Microbiologists have discovered a previously unknown central metabolic pathway in microorganisms. The life forms use this pathway to survive under extremely salty conditions, such as in the Dead Sea. See article.
g Intelligence - What sounds like science fiction is actually possible: thanks to magnetic stimulation, the activity of certain brain nerve cells can be deliberately influenced. What happens in the brain in this context has been unclear up to now. Medical experts have now shown that various stimulus patterns changed the activity of distinct neuronal cell types. In addition, certain stimulus patterns led to rats learning more easily. The knowledge obtained could contribute to cerebral stimulation being used more purposefully in future to treat functional disorders of the brain. See article.
g Message - "If we want to find evidence for the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations, we must work out an observational strategy for detecting this evidence in order to establish the various physical quantities in which it involves,” according to the paper “Detectability of Extraterrestrial Technological Activities.” “This information must be carefully analyzed so that it is neither over-interpreted nor overlooked and can be checked by independent researchers.” Read the entire paper online. This paper is from 1992.
g Cosmicus - NASA unveiled new technology ideas for the future of space exploration in a series of panels last week that encourage the public to weigh in on where the space agency's limited funding should go. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Fizzy ocean on Enceladus and imagining ETI

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Abodes - In 2005, Cassini spotted plumes erupting from Saturn's moon Enceladus. Since then scientists have debated whether or not the tiny moon has a liquid ocean beneath its surface. New data indicates that not only does Enceladus have a liquid ocean, but it may be fizzy like a soft drink and friendly to microbial life. See article.
g Life - Physicists and bioengineers have developed an optical instrument allowing them to control the behavior of a worm just by shining a tightly focused beam of light at individual neurons inside the organism. See article.
g Intelligence - Artifacts unearthed in the United Arab Emirates date back 100,000 years and imply that modern humans first left Africa much earlier than researchers had expected, a new study reports. In light of their excavation, an international team of researchers suggests that humans could have arrived on the Arabian Peninsula as early as 125,000 years ago - directly from Africa rather than via the Nile Valley or the Near East, as researchers have suggested in the past. See article.
g Cosmicus - Coming soon: hopping moon robots for private lunar landing. See article.
g Imagining - Here’s a neat thought experiment: What might a intelligent alien that evolved from a stingray-like creature look like? See article.
g Aftermath - Look for an intriguing book to read: “Space, the Final Frontier?” by G. Genta e M. Rycroft. Published in 2003. The book primarily examines how we can become a spacefaring civilization, but it does include an interesting chapter about life in the universe, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, the Drake Equation, intelligent lifeforms, whether other lifeforms will be more like ET or Alien, and the possible humanoid characteristics of extraterrestrials. See commentary and table ofcontents.

Read this blogger’s books

Saturday, January 29, 2011

SETI, USC joins forces and new group of algae discovered

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - The sun unleashed two powerful solar eruptions Friday in a spectacular double blast caught on camera by a NASA spacecraft. See article.
g Life - A team of biologists has discovered an entirely new group of algae living in a wide variety of marine and freshwater environments. This group of algae, which the researchers dubbed "rappemonads," have DNA that is distinctly different from that of other known algae. In fact, humans and mushrooms are more closely related to each other than rappemonads are to some other common algae (such as green algae). Based on their DNA analysis, the researchers believe that they have discovered not just a new species or genus, but a potentially large and novel group of microorganisms. See article.
g Intelligence - Psychologists have found that infants less than one year old understand social dominance and use relative size to predict who will prevail when two individuals' goals conflict. See article.
g Message - An affiliation between the University of Southern California and the SETI Institute will create formal ties between one of America's premier research universities and one of the most innovative and highly regarded scientific research institutions. See article.
g Cosmicus - If you need a place to launch a rocket or put together a spaceship, you may be in luck: NASA is looking to rent out many of the facilities at its Kennedy Space Center in Florida. See article.
g Imagining - The students of Prof. Joan Slonczewski, who taught “Biology 103: Biology in Science Fiction” at Kenyon College in 2003, in a class project used astrobiological principles to create a number of plausible alien civilizations and worlds. Here’s one, called the seaswallower.

Read this blogger’s books

Friday, January 28, 2011

ETI timing its precursor signal and inflatable module on ISS

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Abodes - The object that plowed into Jupiter in 2009, creating a giant scar, was most likely an asteroid the size of the Titanic, rather than a comet, the latest evidence suggests. See article.
g Life - A paper just published in the journal Science reports that in some cases animal migrations could actually help reduce the spread and prevalence of disease and may even promote the evolution of less-virulent disease strains. See article.
g Intelligence - Orangutan DNA is more diverse than human's and remarkably stable through the ages, new research shows. See article.
g Message - Phoning home intergalactically may have one natural prerequisite if a civilization is hoping to connect: timing their precursor signal or “ring” so that we might know that they're broadcasting. Dr. Robin Corbet, of the Universities' Space Research Association, discusses his research findings on Synchronized SETI. Note: This article is from 2002.
g Cosmicus - The International Space Station could get a new inflatable module supplied by the private American company Bigelow Aerospace, sources say. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Thursday, January 27, 2011

Primer to SETI history and determining pterodactyl gender

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Life - The discovery of an ancient fossil, nicknamed “Mrs. T,” has allowed scientists for the first time to sex pterodactyls - flying reptiles that lived alongside dinosaurs between 220-65 million years ago. See article.
g Intelligence - Can't help molding some snow into a ball and hurling it or tossing a stone as far into a lake as you can? New research from shows how humans, unlike any other species on Earth, readily learn to throw long distances. This research also suggests that this unique evolutionary trait is entangled with language development in a way critical to our very existence. See article.
g Message - Want to get a sense of SETI’s history and varying projects? Jodrell Bank Observatory offers an easy to follow yet informative primer.
g Cosmicus - Many people on Earth have taken advantage of NASA-developed fire-resistant textiles – all without ever having to hurtle into the cosmos or plunge back into the planet's atmosphere. The agency's advanced research on thermal barriers and insulation for spacesuits, space shuttles and other vehicles have found earthly applications in firefighting, the military, motor sports and other industries. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

‘The Living Cosmos’ and solar sails unfurled

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Abodes - New research shows that massive volcanic eruptions may have played a role in one of Earth's largest mass extinction events. Many theories have been put forth about the causes of the Permian extinction, but now scientists may have found an answer. See article.
g Life - Book alert: “The Living Cosmos” by Chris Impey draws readers into the scientific search for life in the universe. After centuries of speculation, we are on the verge of learning if biology is unique to the Earth. “The Living Cosmos” is a snapshot of the interdisciplinary field called astrobiology, weaving in stories of discovery by leading researchers. The book presents recent information on the origin and evolution of life on Earth. The vastness of space and the eons since the big bang present a great potential for biology both familiar and unfamiliar. The discoveries of astrobiology may soon redefine our place in the universe.
g Intelligence - Can't help molding some snow into a ball and hurling it or tossing a stone as far into a lake as you can? New research from Indiana University and the University of Wyoming shows how humans, unlike any other species on Earth, readily learn to throw long distances. This research also suggests that this unique evolutionary trait is entangled with language development in a way critical to our very existence. See article.
g Message - In late 1997, after almost 40 years of operation, the Ohio State University Radio Observatory and its "Big Ear" radio telescope — which picked up the famous “Wow!” signal — ceased operation. The land on which the observatory was sitting (owned by the Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware, Ohio) was sold in 1983 to land developers who later claimed their rights to develop the property. The telescope was destroyed in early 1998. Here's a Web page memorial.
g Cosmicus - Talk about a comeback story: A tiny NASA satellite once teetering on failure has successfully unfurled its solar sail while orbiting the Earth. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Chaotic dynamics of signal transmission in brains and primer for decoding messages from extraterrestrials

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - A massive star flung away from its former companion is plowing through space dust. The result is a brilliant bow shock, seen as a yellow arc in a new image from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE. See article.
g Abodes - New studies have shown that scientists have underestimated the effect that two chemical compounds may have on Earth's climate. Carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide can contribute to global warming and climate change, and might bring about a climate on Earth that life has never experienced before. See article.
g Life - In birds as in people, female fertility declines with age. But some female birds can slow the ticking of their biological clocks by choosing the right mates, says a new study. See article.
g Intelligence - The dynamics behind signal transmission in the brain are extremely chaotic. This conclusion has been reached by scientists. In addition, researchers calculated, for the first time, how quickly information stored in the activity patterns of the cerebral cortex neurons is discarded. At one bit per active neuron per second, the speed at which this information is forgotten is surprisingly high. See article.
g Aftermath - Will we ever find a primer for decoding messages from extraterrestrials? A few years ago, anthropologists who gathered for a major conference in Atlanta heard some news that will be sobering for SETI enthusiasts: it may be much more difficult to understand extraterrestrials than many scientists have thought before. See article. This article is from 2005.

Read this blogger’s books

Monday, January 24, 2011

Betelgeuse’s misreported demise and modern artists imagine extraterrestrials

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - Several online news sites, including the Huffington Post, have reported that the star Betelgeuse will undergo a supernova explosion next year — yes, that's 2012 — and shine as brightly in the sky as a second sun. But according to scientists, it's all nonsense. See article.
g Abodes - Twenty-five years ago, NASA made its only visit thus far to the planet Uranus. Voyager 2 returned unexpected images of an active planet and moons with dramatic surface features. The visit expanded our knowledge of the planets and helped astrobiologists understand whether or not planets and moons in the outer solar system could be habitable. See article.
g Life - Using a horror film to bring your date closer is a classic move in the teenage playbook. Now, a study of Australian birds finds that other animals use the same "scary movie effect" to attract female attention, by hitchhiking mating signals onto the calls of predators. See article.
g Message - Just exactly how does SETI work? See primer.
g Cosmicus - Scientists from Oxford University have made a significant step towards an ultrafast quantum computer by successfully generating 10 billion bits of quantum entanglement in silicon for the first time - entanglement is the key ingredient that promises to make quantum computers far more powerful than conventional computing devices. See article.
g Imagining - Here’s a review of the work by some modern artists who’ve imagined what extraterrestrials might look like.

Read this blogger’s books

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Galaxy population grows by 20% and metabolic tricks

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - An international team of scientists using data from NASA's Swift satellite confirms the existence of a largely unseen population of black-hole-powered galaxies. Their X-ray emissions are so heavily absorbed that little more than a dozen are known. Yet astronomers say that despite the deeply dimmed X-rays, the sources may represent the tip of the iceberg, accounting for at least one-fifth of all active galaxies. See article.
g Life - Scientists have discovered a unique method by which a marine bacterium recycles iron and uses the essential nutrient to perform completely different cellular functions. This metabolic trick has major implications for the Earth's biosphere because the bacterium's survival is vital for the ocean food web. See article.
g Message - A team of American scientists note that recent astrophysical discoveries suggest that we should find ourselves in the midst of one or more extraterrestrial civilizations. Moreover, they argue it is a mistake to reject all UFO reports since some evidence for the theoretically predicted extraterrestrial visitors might just be found there. See article. This article is from 2005.
g Cosmicus - Want to build a really tough robot? Forget about Terminator. Instead, watch a tadpole turn into a frog. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Saturday, January 22, 2011

SetiQuest and rockets without fuel

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - For 10 days in December, a mob of icy comets pelted the sun in an extraordinary cosmic storm. Scientists who monitored the solar tempest now think the flurry of sundiving comets might herald a much bigger comet to come – one that could potentially be visible to the naked eye. See article.
g Abodes - Book alert: In “The Crowded Universe,” Alan Boss, a theoretical astrophysicist who has studied models of planet formation, provides a broad, general review of the recent history of exoplanet discovery. Starting from the mid-1990s and going through late 2008, Boss reviews the discoveries of the first exoplanets around Sun-like stars and major discovery milestones that have occurred since then, including finding multiple-planet systems, directly imaging exoplanets, and discoveries of atmospheres and their compositions of some of these distant worlds. He expands his scope beyond just discoveries, though, to cover topics like the theory of planet formation, development of spacecraft missions, and some of the related policy issues, including changes in NASA leadership and the struggles to secure funding for and manage some key exoplanet missions like Kepler, which was in danger of cancellation as recently as 2007. See review by Jeff Foust.
g Life - A team of paleontologists and geologists from Argentina and the United States on Jan. 13 announced the discovery of a lanky dinosaur that roamed South America in search of prey as the age of dinosaurs began, approximately 230 million years ago. See article.
g Intelligence - Participating in an 8-week mindfulness meditation program appears to make measurable changes in brain regions associated with memory, sense of self, empathy and stress. In a study that will appear in the January 30 issue of Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, a team led by Massachusetts General Hospital researchers report the results of their study, the first to document meditation-produced changes over time in the brain's grey matter. See article.
g Message - setiQuest is an effort to tap into the global brain trust, harness the power of citizen scientists, and educate the next generation of Earthlings to improve current searches for extraterrestrial intelligence and better understand our place in the cosmos. We are creating a community - or if you prefer, a tribe - to actively involve the world in the ultimate search for cosmic company.
g Cosmicus - An advanced rocket propulsion concept calls for heating a rocket’s propellant by focusing energy on it from ground-based lasers or microwave sources. The technology could cut the cost of putting payloads into orbit by a factor of five or more. See article.
g Aftermath - Science fiction author David Brin offers a copy of his 1983 article “Xenology: The Science of Asking Who’s Out There”. Though nearly three decades old, the information is still relevant and offers a good overview of fundamental astrobiological questions. See paper.

Read this blogger’s books

Friday, January 21, 2011

Amino-acid creating asteroids and ‘Consequences of a Discovery’

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Abodes - A wider range of asteroids were capable of creating the kind of amino acids used by life on Earth, according to new NASA research. See article.
g Life - Two of the greatest mass extinctions in Earth's history may have been caused by the loss of diversity in the oceans. New research shows that the die-off of species may have ultimately led to the collapse of marine ecosystems. The study could be an ominous warning for the future of life on Earth as modern ocean diversity begins to dwindle. See article.
g Intelligence - To rebuild damaged parts of a human body from scratch is a dream that has long fired human imagination, from Mary Shelley's Doctor Frankenstein to modern day surgeons. Now, a team of European scientists, working in the frame of the EUREKA project ModPolEUV, has made a promising contribution to reconstructive surgery, thanks to an original multidisciplinary approach matching cutting-edge medicine to the latest developments in nanotechnology. See article.
g Cosmicus - A new fractional vortex state observed in an unconventional superconductor may offer the first glimpse of an exotic state of matter predicted theoretically for more than 30 years. See article.
g Aftermath - Here’s an intriguing article that is frequently referenced in astrobiology papers: "The Consequences of a Discovery: Different Scenarios" by astronomer Ivan Almar. Note: This paper is from 1995.


Read this blogger’s books

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Pulsating star hosts exoplanet and the earliest life’s feedback loops

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - A group of researchers has discovered, for the first time, a delta Scuti pulsating star that hosts a hot giant transiting planet. See article.
g Abodes - A new study shows how the fossil record can greatly aid in interpreting modern biodiversity and ecological trends. The data could be useful for astrobiologists studying how climate and ecosystem change could affect the future of life on Earth. See article.
g Life - All life today incorporates a variety of systems controlled by negative feedback loops and sometimes amplified by positive feedback loops. The first forms of life necessarily also required primitive versions of feedback, yet surprisingly little emphasis has been given to the question of how feedback emerged out of primarily chemical systems. One chemical system has been established that spontaneously develops autocatalytic feedback, the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction. See essay.
g Intelligence - Researchers have discovered a molecule that can make brain cells resistant to programmed cell death or apoptosis. See article.
g Message - Two opposing tendencies paradoxically coexist in terrestrial consciousness - the insistent quest for intelligent signals from other civilizations and the persistent aversion to any attempts to transmit such signals from Earth toward probable fellow intelligent beings. If typical for our entire Universe, such manifestations of intelligence would make the search for other civilizations totally meaningless. See article.
g Cosmicus - Researchers from Northwestern University and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign are the first to develop a curvilinear camera, much like the human eye, with the significant feature of a zoom capability, unlike the human eye. See article.
g Aftermath - What role will extraterrestrials play in humanity’s future? Here’s a paper by University of Toronto Professor Allen Tough. Though written more than 20 years ago, the paper contains plenty of useful ideas that are fresh (and ignored) today, especially those about extraterrestrial behavior and help.

Read this blogger’s books

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Exoplanets with highly tilted orbits and better odds detecting ETI’s radar signals

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - Two companion galaxies couldn't look more different from one another, a new photo from NASA's WISE telescope reveals. See article.
g Abodes - New research shows that exoplanetary systems with highly tilted orbits might be typical rather than rare. The study provides important information for testing models of how the orbits of planetary systems evolve and could help astrobiologists better understand where and how to search for new planets. See article.
g Life - Any definition is intricately connected to a theory that gives it meaning. Accordingly, this article discusses various definitions of life held in the astrobiology community by considering their connected ‘‘theories of life.’’ These include certain ‘‘list’’ definitions and a popular definition that holds that life is a ‘‘self-sustaining chemical system capable of Darwinian evolution.’’
g Message - A comparison of the total number of the radar astronomy transmissions with respect to that used for sending messages to extraterrestrial civilizations reveals that the probability of detection of the radio signals to extraterrestrials is one million times smaller than that of the radar signals used to study planets and asteroids in the solar system. See article.
g Cosmicus - After more than four decades of humans sending robotic missions to the Red Planet, Mars science is entering a new phase, coinciding with the launch of NASA's Curiosity rover planned for this later this year, according to experts who spoke at a panel discussion last week. See article.
g Imagining - While I’m researching our next alien, browse the local used bookstores for this volume, which examined the scientific plausibility of many alien creatures in “Star Trek”: “To Seek Out New Life: The Biology of Star Trek.” Published in 2001, Athena Andreadis' book makes a good read, boosted by her background as a molecular biologist and neurosurgeon. See review.

Read this blogger’s books

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Explaining and defining life, transmitting A Message from Earth

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - Using two NASA X-ray satellites, astronomers have discovered what drives the "heartbeats" seen in the light from an unusual black hole system. These results give new insight into the ways that black holes can regulate their intake and severely curtail their growth. See article.
g Life - Here’s a paper that addresses the open philosophical and scientific problem of explaining and defining life. This problem is controversial, and there is nothing approaching a consensus about what life is. This raises a philosophical meta-question: Why is life so controversial and so difficult to define? The paper proposes that we can attribute a significant part of the controversy over life to use of a Cartesian approach to explaining life, which seeks necessary and sufficient conditions for being an individual living organism, out of the context of other organisms and the abiotic environment.
g Message - Humans already are sending messages aliens – evne though we don’t really know if anyone is on the receiving end. For example, AMFE - A Message from Earth - is a high-powered digital radio signal that was sent on 9 October 2008 towards Gliese 581 c, a large terrestrial extrasolar planet orbiting the red dwarf star Gliese 581. See article.
g Cosmicus - Companies hoping to mine the moon's huge stores of water ice can likely do so legally, experts say, though firms may want to hold off until new legislation grants them explicit title over whatever lunar muck they dredge up. See article.
g Learning - Digitalis Education Solutions has published 12 astronomy lesson plans for use with kindergarten through 12th grade students. Lessons are aligned with the National Science Education Standards and cover a variety of topics, including moon phases, solstices, equinoxes and debunking astrology. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Monday, January 17, 2011

Definitions of life through the ages and discovering Galaxy X

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - A dwarf galaxy that is too dim to see but is suspected to orbit our own Milky Way may soon be revealed using a new mathematical technique that analyzes the ripples of gas in spiral galaxies. See article.
g Life - In spite of the spectacular developments in our understanding of the molecular basis that underlies biological phenomena, we still lack a generally agreed-upon definition of life, but this is not for want of trying. Life is an empirical concept; and, as suggested by the many unsuccessful efforts to define it, this task is likely to remain, at best, a work in progress. Although phenomenological characterizations of life are feasible, a precise definition of life remains an elusive intellectual endeavor. This is not surprising: As Nietszche once wrote, there are concepts that can be defined, whereas others only have a history. Here’s an essay that discusses some of the manifold (and often unsatisfactory) definitions of life that have been attempted from different intellectual and scientific perspectives and reflect, at least in part, the key role that historical frameworks play.
g Message - What sort of signal would satisfactorily announce an extraterrestrial intelligence as detected by radio-emission or light reception? For an opinion article on what sort of signal is a SETI hit, click here.
g Cosmicus - Researchers have demonstrated bio-inspired structures that self-assemble from simple building blocks: spheres. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Earth from a xenobiological perspective and video game designs RNA molecules

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - Cosmic lenses created by the ultra-strong gravity of some objects in space may spoil upcoming estimates of the number of galaxies during the universe's earliest days by as much as a factor of 10, a new study warns. See article.
g Abodes - The magnitude of climate change during Earth's deep past suggests that future temperatures may eventually rise far more than projected if society continues its pace of emitting greenhouse gases, a new analysis concludes. See article.
g Life - Xenobiology – the study of alien lifeforms – is a major subdiscipline within the xenological sciences. Its subject matter is the set of all possible life systems in the universe, rather than just the biology of a single world. The common assertion that xenobiology is “a science in search of a subject” because no extraterrestrials have yet been found ignores the long evolutionary history of our planet. From the cosmic point of view, Earth is an alien world as exotic as any in the galaxy. See article. This article is from 1981.
g Cosmicus - An American space tourism company that sells multimillion-dollar tourist flights to the International Space Station announced Jan. 12 that it will resume the high-society spaceflights in 2013, after a five-year lull. See article.
g Learning - A new video game is teaching gamers the principles for designing molecules of RNA. Each week, the top designs from the game will be synthesized in a biochemistry lab for scientists to study. RNA is one of the key regulators in living cells. Studying RNA can teach astrobiologists about some of life's most basic mechanisms. See article.
g Imagining - Star Trek’s very first alien, the Talosians, pose quite an evolutionary challenge: Their heads are oversized because of large, powerful brains capable of telepathy and even mind control of others. First off, a brain of that size must demand a lot of energy. This is somewhat addressed through the large arteries and veins apparent on their bald heads; their frail bodies also indicate fewer cells below the neckline for oxygen-carrying blood to support. But they probably also need greater lung capacity to cycle more oxygen into their bodies as well as a larger heart for pumping that oxygen-laden blood to and through the brain. Their bodies don’t indicate larger lungs, however. Another problem with their head/brain size is giving birth. The enormity of the head is limited by the size and shape of the pelvis — and their human shape and gait indicates they couldn’t give birth to an infant with a head any larger than ours. A possibility is that their the brain primarily develops outside of the womb; perhaps they grow in their telepathic powers as they age. Another possibility: They are not born naturally but artificially created, indicating a separation from among the most basic instincts – mating. The Talosians, after all, are fairly unimaginative creatures, dependent upon probing the minds of others for new experiences! As for their telepathic and power of illusion capabilities, we’ll just have to presume that somehow their brain lobes have evolved sections capable of connecting and interacting across the medium of air with another creature’s neurons.
g Aftermath - Given the plethora of New Age/UFOlogy Web sites about alien contact, it’s refreshing to find one that’s serious. Try the “extraterrestrial intelligence, implications following first contact” entry at astrobiologist David Darling’s site “The Encyclopedia of Astrobiology, Astronomy, and Spaceflight”. It includes some links and a mini reference list.

Read this blogger’s books

Saturday, January 15, 2011

‘After contact, Then What?’ and protocluster of glaxies

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - Astronomers have glimpsed a “protocluster” of galaxies as they appeared only a billion years after the Big Bang, making it the most distant galaxy cluster yet seen. See article.
g Life - Few scientific studies have drawn the level of criticism from the blogosphere and international scientific community lately as a study by scientists at the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource and astrobiologists at NASA last month. The paper, titled “Bacterium that can grow using arsenic instead of phosphorus,” claims to have found a bacterium strain in California’s Mono Lake “which substitutes arsenic for phosphorus to sustain its growth.” See article.
g Cosmicus - The private spaceflight company Virgin Galactic scored another successful drop test of its SpaceShipTwo suborbital spacecraft Thursday, the latest in a series of smooth solo glides over the California desert for the commercial spaceship. See article.
g Aftermath - Though an older Web posting, article shows how little we’ve thought about this question.

Read this blogger’s books

Friday, January 14, 2011

How hot-Jupiter systems evolve and trends in popular culture about first contact

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - A Jupiter-like alien planet that feeds momentum to its host star may help astronomers understand how a class of solar systems form and evolve, scientists report. See article.
g Abodes - Earth's climate could take 100,000 years or longer to recover from rising CO2 if we don't mitigate our carbon emissions. Scientists studying one ancient bout of global warming 56 million years ago found that CO2 took about 30,000 to 40,000 years to settle out of the atmosphere. See article.
g Life - Studying heat-loving microbes living under extreme conditions in hydrothermal sites at Yellowstone National Park might help answer some of the most important questions that scientists have ever asked about life as we know or can imagine it. That includes the question of whether there might be life on planets and moons elsewhere in the universe. See article.
g Intelligence - Scientists have found that the pleasurable experience of listening to music releases dopamine, a neurotransmitter in the brain important for more tangible pleasures associated with rewards such as food, drugs and sex. See article.
g Imagining - Another early “Star Trek” alien is the Exo III android makers. We really don’t know what the android creators (aka “the Old Ones”) looked like, but we can presume by the way human duplicates were created with the android-making machine that they appear like Ruk (click here and look for photo with caption “Ruk is shot by phaser”). Their height indicates that the planet’s gravity is slightly lighter than Earth’s, and there isn’t a discernable difference in the way humans step on this world. Possibly the savanna grass was taller than in our Africa (their hominid shape indicates a primate-oriented evolution). The whitish pallor probably is due to the lack of sunlight (though not the cold, as that also would make their bodies more compact); the aliens did go underground when a global ice age gripped their world. One interesting question is if they possessed the ability to build androids, why didn’t they just leave their planet when its habitability was lowered? Perhaps some religious or cultural belief prevented them from considering or pursuing space travel; possibly they developed the android-making machine when residing underground. While the show’s creators did a good job of making the Old Ones evolutionarily sound given the world’s climate of the past several eons, the aliens fall short on the Earth vertebrate factor: It’s highly unlikely that the exact facial arrangements as those of Earth’s vertebrates when first leaving the water for land would be so exactly duplicated.
g Aftermath - For one futurist’s thoughts about what will happen to humanity when we make first contact with aliens, click here. I offer this site not for its scientific rigor but as an example of something all of us who care about astrobiology should consider: What are the trends in popular culture about first contact? Such thinking will greatly influence public reaction when first contact actually does occur.

Read this blogger’s books

Thursday, January 13, 2011

XNA and acquisitive and resource-hungry aliens

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - In a study that pushes the limits of observations currently possible from Earth, a team of NASA and European scientists recorded the "fingerprints" of mystery molecules in two distant galaxies, Andromeda and the Triangulum. Astronomers can count on one hand the number of galaxies examined so far for such fingerprints, which are thought to belong to large organic molecules. See article.
g Abodes - ASU scientists and collaborators have sampled one of the numerous "Pozas Rojas" (Red Pools) in the desert oasis of Cuatro Cienegas, Mexico. These pools vary tremendously in temperature (from freezing in winter to 40 C in summer) and salinity (from relatively fresh to encrusted with salt) during the annual season but nevertheless are full of diverse and fully functional microbial communities studied at ASU's NASA-funded Astrobiology program. See article.
g Life - Synthetic biologists try to engineer useful biological systems that do not exist in nature. One of their goals is to design an orthogonal chromosome different from DNA and RNA, termed XNA for xeno nucleic acids. XNA exhibits a variety of structural chemical changes relative to its natural counterparts. These changes make this novel information-storing biopolymer “invisible” to natural biological systems. The lack of cognition to the natural world, however, is seen as an opportunity to implement a genetic firewall that impedes exchange of genetic information with the natural world, which means it could be the ultimate biosafety tool. Here’s an essay that discusses why it is necessary to go ahead designing xenobiological systems like XNA and its XNA binding proteins; what the biosafety specifications should look like for this genetic enclave; which steps should be carried out to boot up the first XNA life form; and what it means for the society at large. See essay.
g Imagining - Could "Star Trek"'s Alfa 177 canine exist? Setting aside the facial features that show the canine is an Earth-descended vertebrate, the answer is yes. The Alfa 113 biome the Enterprise crew visits is cold but dry, perhaps a summer plain set below a great continental ice sheet. In cold climates, life forms need to be compact and/or covered in thick hair or fat; this is so with this creature. In addition, the canine's short legs indicate it need not worry about snowdrifts. Based on the creature's canine teeth and jaw structure, it must be a predator; considering the canine's size, it likely preys on creatures no larger than rats - and rodents are quite abundant on the tundra. A lack of claws indicates it doesn't burrow, however, which probably would be necessary in such a climate. Perhaps caves in the area or other creature's burrows provide shelter. As for the antenna upon its head, I'll withhold speculation!
g Aftermath - When considering the prospect of alien life, humankind should prepare for the worst, according to a new study: Either we're alone, or any aliens out there are acquisitive and resource-hungry, just like us. See article.

Get your SF book manuscript edited

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Small, rocky exoworld discovered and time has come to study the societal consequences of extraterrestrial life

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - The surprising discovery of a supermassive black hole in a small nearby galaxy has given astronomers a tantalizing look at how black holes and galaxies may have grown in the early history of the universe. Finding a black hole a million times more massive than the Sun in a star-forming dwarf galaxy is a strong indication that supermassive black holes formed before the buildup of galaxies, the astronomers said. See article.
g Abodes - NASA has discovered the smallest planet ever seen beyond our solar system – a rocky world just 1.4 times larger than Earth – using its planet-hunting Kepler observatory. See article.
g Life - If you want to be surrounded by females on the prowl, it pays to be cool, at least if you are a male butterfly. See article.
g Message - Book alert: “Talking About Life” consists of a series of interviews conducted by Chris Impey with over three dozen people who have played a role, in one manner or another, in studying the potential for life to exist elsewhere in the universe. See review.
g Cosmicus - SPACE.com asked many scientists, astronauts and space leaders about the role our moon could play in future exploration. Here, then, is the case for the moon. See article.
g Aftermath - The proceedings of a scientific conference that studied the societal consequences of extraterrestrial life has just been released. Organized and hosted by the Royal Society in October 2010, the conference was titled, “The detection of extra-terrestrial life and the consequences for science and society.” In the published proceedings, conference participants believe that the time has come to study the societal consequences of extraterrestrial life. See article

Get your SF book manuscript edited

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Reacting to our first phone call from ETI and molecules choosing left- or right-handedness

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - Is the expansion of the universe accelerating for some unknown reason? This is one of the mysteries plaguing astrophysics, and somewhere in distant galaxies are yet unseen supernovae that may hold the key. Now, thanks to a telescope calibrated by scientists, astrophysicists can be more certain of one day obtaining an accurate answer. See article.
g Life - Certain molecules do exist in two forms which are symmetrical mirror images of each other: they are known as chiral molecules. On Earth, the chiral molecules of life, especially amino acids and sugars, exist in only one form, either left-handed or right-handed. Why is it that life has initially chosen one form over the other? See article.
g Intelligence - Babies, even those too young to talk, can understand many of the words that adults are saying - and their brains process them in a grown-up way. See article.
g Imagining - The group #Xenobiology-Club is a hub for and a collective gallery for thoseinterested in that subset of speculative fiction that comprehends the development of hypothetical extrasolar worlds and their biological denizens according to current scientific knowledge. See article.
g Aftermath - How will humanity react when we receive our first interstellar phone call from ET? Though not a new piece, SETI astronomer Seth Shostak offers some intriguing thoughts. This article is from 2004.

Read this blogger’s books

Monday, January 10, 2011

Artificial proteins and alien eveasdropping

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - Two ESA observatories have combined forces to show the Andromeda Galaxy in a new light. Herschel sees rings of star formation in this, the most detailed image of the Andromeda Galaxy ever taken at infrared wavelengths, and XMM-Newton shows dying stars shining X-rays into space. See article.
g Life - A team of researchers has constructed artificial proteins that enable the growth of living cells. The achievement could help scientists 'build' new biological systems, and provide new information about the origin and evolution of life. See article.
g Intelligence - Researchers discovered that a border collie comprehends the names of over 1,000 objects, differentiating between names of objects and orders to fetch them. This research deepens the findings of researchers in Germany, who had discovered a dog that knew the names of a couple of hundred objects. Important questions were left open as to how far a dog could go, and whether the dog really understood that the object names were nouns and not commands to retrieve the object. See article.
g Message - For more than 80 years, we’ve been sending radio (and eventually television) transmissions into space, allowing anyone in space to hear war reports from London, “I Love Lucy” reruns and our latest election results. So wouldn’t hearing aliens be as simple as turning on the radio? See Here’s why not. This article is from 2004.
g Cosmicus - Quote of the Day: “Man must rise above the earth – to the top of the atmosphere and beyond – for only thus will he fully understand the world in which he lives.” - Socrates

Read this blogger’s books

Sunday, January 09, 2011

Looking for ETI’s powerful light pulses and emotion-coded tears

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - One of the most enduring mysteries in solar physics is why the Sun's outer atmosphere, or corona, is millions of degrees hotter than its surface. See article.
g Abodes - Signals from seismic sensors left on the lunar surface by Apollo astronauts in the 1970s have revealed new insight into the moon's core, thanks to a fresh analysis using 21st century computing power. See article.
g Life - Researchers are studying some of the earliest skeletons in order to better understand the ancient advancement of animal life. See article.
g Intelligence - Emotional crying is a universal, uniquely human behavior. When we cry, we clearly send all sorts of emotional signals. In a paper published online January 6 in Science Express, scientists demonstrated that some of these signals are chemically encoded in the tears themselves. Specifically, they found that merely sniffing a woman's tears - even when the crying woman is not present - reduces sexual arousal in men. See article.
g Message - In 2001, California astronomers broadened the search for extraterrestrial intelligence with a new experiment to look for powerful light pulses beamed our way from other star systems. Scientists from the University of California's Lick Observatory, the SETI Institute, UC-Santa Cruz, and UC-Berkeley used the Lick Observatory's 40-inch Nickel Telescope with a new pulse-detection system capable of finding laser beacons from civilizations many light-years distant. Unlike other optical SETI searches, this new experiment is largely immune to false alarms that slow the reconnaissance of target stars. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Saturday, January 08, 2011

Oxygen-rich oceans and ‘The Eerie Silence’

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Life - The conventional view of the history of the Earth is that the oceans became oxygen-rich to approximately the degree they are today in the Late Ediacaran Period (about 600 million years ago) after staying relatively oxygen-poor for the preceding four billion years. But biogeochemists have found evidence that shows that the ocean went back to being "anoxic" or oxygen-poor around 499 million years ago, soon after the first appearance of animals on the planet, and remained anoxic for 2-4 million years. What's more, the researchers suggest that such anoxic conditions may have been commonplace over a much broader interval of time, with their data capturing a particularly good example. See article.
g Intelligence - A new study following the evolution of lice shows modern humans started wearing clothes about 170,000 years ago, a technology which enabled them to successfully migrate out of Africa. See article.
g Message - Book alert: “The Eerie Silence: Are We Alone In The Universe?” by Paul Davies takes a look at the approaches being taken by researchers in myriad fields such as physics, astronomy, cosmology, astrobiology to look for alien life. See review.
g Cosmicus - The director of America's first commercial spaceport — now under construction in the New Mexico desert — has resigned, citing pressure from the state's new Republican governor. See article.
g Learning - A free color 2011 calendar is free for download from Montana State University's Astrobiology Biogeocatalysis Research Center (ABRC). The calendar includes facts about astrobiology research and extreme organisms in Yellowstone National Park, as well as a few astrobiology-related resources. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Friday, January 07, 2011

Viking may have found Martian life and outer space code of conduct

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Abodes - NASA's Viking landers may have detected the ingredients for life on Mars after all, according to a new study. See article.
g Life - Three-dimensional X-ray scanning equipment is being used to help chart the evolution of flight in birds, by digitally reconstructing the size of bird brains using ancient fossils and modern bird skulls. See article.
g Message - Although the title of “Aliens: Can We Make Contact with Extraterrestrial Intelligence?” by Andrew J. H. Clark, David H. Clark, may conjure up visions of “The X-Files,” this sensible book has more affinity with the movie “Contact.” Above all, it is a plea for continued support of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, presently conducted as the privately funded Project Phoenix due to the withdrawal of government backing. Although readers of other major books on this subject, such as the classic “Are We Alone?” by Paul Davies or the more recent “Probability One,” will be familiar with much of the material here, this is a solid primer for those new to the actual science involved in current efforts to find ETI. See reviews.
g Cosmicus - There's been some pushing and shoving lately to establish a global "Code of Conduct" for outer space — a protection clause for various international factions keen on preventing nefarious actions by others in the final frontier. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Thursday, January 06, 2011

Tectonic Saturn moon and NASA outsources spacecraft

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - A gorgeous new image from the European Southern Observatory reveals the glowing, blue Lagoon Nebula – a hotbed of star birth – amid a backdrop speckled with bright stars. See article.
g Abodes - New images of Saturn's moon Rhea have revealed dramatic fractures cutting through craters on the moon's surface. The findings are helping astrobiologists understand the processes that occur on moons of giant planets, and could help identify potentially habitable environments on these small worlds. See article.
g Life - Scientists have provided the first details about the mysterious flashes of dazzling bioluminescent light produced by a little-known sea snail. See article.
g Message - Recent discussions within the SETI community have thoroughly explored the issue of whether people with access to radio telescopes should send powerful signals to alien civilizations without some process of prior international consultation. In particular, those exchanges have focused on the question of "Active SETI." See article.
g Cosmicus - Outsourcing will soon hit the National Aeronautics and Space Administration hard. The new NASA budget calls for the U.S. space agency to outsource rocket development for manned space flights — historically a NASA strength — to commercial companies. NASA astronauts now will be stuck riding in commercial space taxis — a sorry state of affairs for the organization that won the race to the Moon. See opinion column.

Read this blogger’s books

Wednesday, January 05, 2011

Evolution of immune systems and 10-year-old discovers supernova

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Life - Studying how bacteria incorporate foreign DNA from invading viruses into their own regulatory processes is uncovering the secrets of one of nature's most primitive immune systems. See article.
g Intelligence - Scientists are developing technology that could ultimately sequence a person's genome in mere minutes, at a fraction of the cost of current commercial techniques. See article.
g Message - A number of searches for extraterrestrial intelligence actually have occurred, are ongoing and are planned. Here’s one of the more famous ones: Project BETA, at Harvard University. See article.
g Learning - It may have only appeared as a tiny, glowing spot hovering over a distant galaxy, but the sight made a precocious 10-year-old amateur astronomer the youngest person ever to have detected a stellar explosion called a supernova. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Tuesday, January 04, 2011

Martian tectonic activity and careers in exobiology

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Abodes - A patch of land near the huge Martian volcano Olympus Mons may bear evidence of recent tectonic activity on the Red Planet, new research suggests. See article.
g Life - Researchers have unearthed a mysterious link between bones of an ancient lizard found in Africa and the biggest, baddest modern-day lizard of them all, the Komodo dragon, half a world away in Indonesia. See article.
g Intelligence - A large collaborative study has added to the growing list of genetic variants that determine how tall a person will be. The research, published on Dec. 30 in the American Journal of Human Genetics, identifies uncommon and previously unknown variants associated with height and might provide insight into the genetic architecture of other complex traits. See article.
g Message - Visiting another civilization on a distant world would be fascinating, but at present such a trip is beyond our capabilities. However, it is perfectly within our capabilities to develop a communications system using a powerful transmitter and a sensitive receiver, and using it to search the sky for alien worlds whose citizens have a similar inclination. See article.
g Learning - In field of exobiology entails many different disciplines. Physicists, biologists, and chemists are just a few of the types of occupations which have a place in exobiology. Indeed, exobiology is one of the most inter-disciplinary fields in the realm of science. With so many different types of jobs, exobiology is a fascinating field to work in, and because it is relatively new, it will be thriving for a long time to come. See article.

Read this blogger’s books

Monday, January 03, 2011

Martian rovers seven years later and changing definition of life

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Abodes - After nearly seven years, the Mars rover Opportunity is still going strong, though it has been driving backward for about two years to spread wear more evenly within its gear mechanisms. Spirit got bogged down in soft sand last year, and the rover stopped communicating with Earth in March 2010. See article.
g Life - NASA scientists have found “alien life” — not in space, but in California, in the form of an exotic microbe with DNA never seen before that feeds on arsenic, a poison. After all the hoopla, science-fiction buffs considered this announcement to be a resounding dud. But to the scientific community, this was a spectacular result. It means that every biology textbook now has to be revised. Even the very definition of life may have to be changed. See article.
g Intelligence - It has long been believed that modern humans emerged from the continent of Africa 200,000 years ago. Now archaeologists have uncovered evidence that Homo sapiens roamed the land now called Israel as early as 400,000 years ago - the earliest evidence for the existence of modern humans anywhere in the world. See article.
g Message - In 2001, California astronomers broadened the search for extraterrestrial intelligence with a new experiment to look for powerful light pulses beamed our way from other star systems. Scientists from the University of California's Lick Observatory, the SETI Institute, UC-Santa Cruz, and UC-Berkeley used the Lick Observatory's 40-inch Nickel Telescope with a new pulse-detection system capable of finding laser beacons from civilizations many light-years distant. Unlike other optical SETI searches, this new experiment is largely immune to false alarms that slow the reconnaissance of target stars. See article.

Read this blogger’s books


Honoring the Past, Inspiring the Future

Sunday, January 02, 2011

Communication with Extraterrestrial Intelligence and more active solar weather ahead

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Stars - 2011 is going to be a key solar weather year as the sun starts to become more active. See article.
g Life - An influx of invasive species can stop the dominant natural process of new species formation and trigger mass extinction events, according to research results published in the journal PLoS ONE. The study of the collapse of Earth's marine life 378 to 375 million years ago suggests that the planet's current ecosystems, which are struggling with biodiversity loss, could meet a similar fate. See article.
g Intelligence - Researchers have discovered evidence to debunk the theory that Neandertals' disappearance was caused in part by a deficient diet - one that lacked variety and was overly reliant on meat. After discovering starch granules from plant food trapped in the dental calculus on 40-thousand-year-old Neandertal teeth, the scientists believe that Neandertals ate a wide variety of plants and included cooked grains as part of a more sophisticated, diverse diet similar to early modern humans. See article.
g Message - Epicurus, in the fourth century BC, believed that the universe contained other worlds like our own, and since his time there has been considerable debate whether extraterrestrial life exists and might communicate with us. In the last quarter of the twentieth century, an international social movement — Communication with Extraterrestrial Intelligence — has emerged which advocates an attempt to achieve communication with extraterrestrial intelligence, and many of its most active members have been leading scientists. Modest efforts to detect radio signals from intelligent extraterrestrials already have been made, both under government aegis and privately funded, and the technical means for a more vigorous search have been developed. If a CETI project were successful, linguists would suddenly have one or more utterly alien languages to study, and some consideration of linguistic issues is a necessary preparation for it. See article. This article is from 1994.

Read this blogger’s books



Honoring the Past, Inspiring the Future

Saturday, January 01, 2011

Subjecting the Fermi Paradox to the Fermi Hypothesis and what makes a face ‘real’?

Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g Life - Studying how bacteria incorporate foreign DNA from invading viruses into their own regulatory processes, researchers are uncovering the secrets of one of nature's most primitive immune systems. See article.
g Intelligence - The face of a doll is clearly not human; the face of a human clearly is. Telling the difference allows us to pay attention to faces that belong to living things, which are capable of interacting with us. But where is the line at which a face appears to be alive? See article.
g Message - To subject the Fermi Paradox to needed experimental testing, a researcher has offered the Artifact Hypothesis: A technologically advanced extraterrestrial civilization has undertaken a long-term program of' interstellar exploration via transmission of material artifacts. See article.

Read this blogger’s books


Honoring the Past, Inspiring the Future