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Fox
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Is It Raining Aliens?
« on: 2006-07-13 15:50:59 » |
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Is It Raining Aliens?
Source: Popular Science
Author: Jebediah Reed
Dated: June 2006
Nearly 50 tons of mysterious red particles showered India in 2001. Now the race is on to figure out what the heck they are.
As bizarre as it may seem, the sample jars brimming with cloudy, reddish rainwater in Godfrey Louis’s laboratory in southern India may hold, well, aliens. In April, Louis, a solid-state physicist at Mahatma Gandhi University, published a paper in the prestigious peer-reviewed journal Astrophysics and Space Science in which he hypothesizes that the samples - water taken from the mysterious blood - colored showers that fell sporadically across Louis’s home state of Kerala in the summer of 2001 - contain microbes from outer space.
Specifically, Louis has isolated strange, thick-walled, red-tinted cell-like structures about 10 microns in size. Stranger still, dozens of his experiments suggest that the particles may lack DNA yet still reproduce plentifully, even in water superheated to nearly 600˚F. (The known upper limit for life in water is about 250˚F.) So how to explain them? Louis speculates that the particles could be extraterrestrial bacteria adapted to the harsh conditions of space and that the microbes hitched a ride on a comet or meteorite that later broke apart in the upper atmosphere and mixed with rain clouds above India. If his theory proves correct, the cells would be the first confirmed evidence of alien life and, as such, could yield tantalizing new clues to the origins of life on Earth.
E.T. Under the Microscope: Scientists have yet to identify the unusual particles [above, magnified 500 times] isolated from India’s mysterious red rainwater.
Last winter, Louis sent some of his samples to astronomer Chandra Wickramasinghe and his colleagues at Cardiff University in Wales, who are now attempting to replicate his experiments; Wickramasinghe expects to publish his initial findings later this year.
Meanwhile, more down-to-earth theories abound. One Indian government investigation conducted in 2001 lays blame for what some have called the “blood rains” on algae. Other theories have implicated fungal spores, red dust swept up from the Arabian peninsula, even a fine mist of blood cells produced by a meteor striking a high-flying flock of bats.
Louis and his colleagues dismiss all these theories, pointing to the fact that both algae and fungus possess DNA and that blood cells have thin walls and die quickly when exposed to water and air. More important, they argue, blood cells don’t replicate. “We’ve already got some stunning pictures—transmission electron micrographs—of these cells sliced in the middle,” Wickramasinghe says. “We see them budding, with little daughter cells inside the big cells.”
Louis’s theory holds special appeal for Wickramasinghe. A quarter of a century ago, he co-authored the modern theory of panspermia, which posits that bacteria-riddled space rocks seeded life on Earth. “If it’s true that life was introduced by comets four billion years ago,” the astronomer says, “one would expect that microorganisms are still injected into our environment from time to time. This could be one of those events.”
The next significant step, explains University of Sheffield microbiologist Milton Wainwright, who is part of another British team now studying Louis’s samples, is to confirm whether the cells truly lack DNA. So far, one preliminary DNA test has come back positive.“Life as we know it must contain DNA, or it’s not life,” he says. “But even if this organism proves to be an anomaly, the absence of DNA wouldn’t necessarily mean it’s extraterrestrial.”
Louis and Wickramasinghe are planning further experiments to test the cells for specific carbon isotopes. If the results fall outside the norms for life on Earth, it would be powerful new evidence for Louis’s idea, of which even Louis himself remains skeptical. “I would be most happy to accept a simpler explanation,” he says, “but I cannot find any."
Life without DNA? How intriguing...
Fox
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falcox
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Re:Is It Raining Aliens?
« Reply #1 on: 2006-07-14 17:21:00 » |
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The thought of highly adaptive alien bacteria falling from the sky frankly scares the hell out of me.. If it could surive a trip through outer space, whats going to stop it here? It may be nothing, but if it is.. What happens when a highly adapted alien super-virus falls from the sky to kill us all?
I'm sure the christians would call it armageddon, I'd just say "Crap, what an intersting way to go.."
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pickler
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I'm a spitting llama!
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Re:Is It Raining Aliens?
« Reply #2 on: 2006-07-15 08:17:41 » |
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Quote:| [falcox]The thought of highly adaptive alien bacteria falling from the sky frankly scares the hell out of me.. If it could survive a trip through outer space, whats going to stop it here? It may be nothing, but if it is.. What happens when a highly adapted alien super-virus falls from the sky to kill us all? |
As with any scientific claim that has not yet been verified by other members of the scientific community, my response is: "I'd like to see independent verification and reproduction of Godfrey Louis's results."
It's also interesting to note that the article (and Louis) focuses ( and insinuates ) on the red particles being of extra terestrial origin. Have we discovered all the existing lifeforms on earth to deem these as extra terestrial? Have all other hypothesis been thoroughly exhausted? Have we Identified that these particles are indeed living? Have we even proven that they are cells ("cell-like" does not equate to cells) ?
I would have also been gratefull if the Popular Science article provided it's readers with a reference to the Astrophysics and Space Science article it briefly mentions.
Let me just say I'm a little too much of a skeptic to take this one at face value.
Quote:| [falcox]What happens when a highly adapted alien super-virus falls from the sky to kill us all? |
I'm sure Jeffrey Goldblum will find some ingenious (yet mind boggling in simplicity) method to defeat the virulent plague. Possibly with a couple of aspirins, plenty of rest, a box of tissues and lots of hot lemon and honey.
oh, not forgetting the home made chicken soup.
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David Lucifer
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Enlighten me.
 
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Re:Is It Raining Aliens?
« Reply #3 on: 2006-07-16 16:23:31 » |
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Quote from: pickler on 2006-07-15 08:17:41
I'm sure Jeffrey Goldblum will find some ingenious (yet mind boggling in simplicity) method to defeat the virulent plague. Possibly with a couple of aspirins, plenty of rest, a box of tissues and lots of hot lemon and honey. |
Goldblum would more likely figure out a way to subject the alien bacteria to Nigerian scam spam, disabling it before it could do much damage.
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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
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Re:Is It Raining Aliens?
« Reply #4 on: 2006-07-29 15:02:47 » |
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[Blunderov] "It's a hard rain that's a'gonna fall." (Bob Dylan) Strange rain anyway. More things that make you go hmm.
http://paranormal.about.com/library/weekly/aa082602b.htm
"WEIRD, WEIRD RAIN" > Page 1, 2
Flesh and Blood
In 1890, Popular Science News reported that blood rained down on Messignadi, Calabria in Italy - bird's blood. It was speculated that the birds were somehow torn part by violent winds, although there were no such winds at the time. And no other parts of the bird came down - just blood.
J. Hudson's farm in Los Nietos Township, California endured a rain of flesh and blood for three minutes in 1869. The grisly fall covered several acres.
The American Journal of Science confirmed a shower of blood, fat and muscle tissue that fell on a tobacco farm near Lebanon, Tennessee in August, 1841. Field workers, who actually experienced this weird shower, said they heard a rattling noise and saw "drops of blood, as they supposed...fell from a red cloud which was flying over."
The Complete Books of Charles Fort
One of the first people to catalog strange phenomena such as rains of fish and frogs - and many other weird goings-on - was Charles Fort. The books in which he recorded these oddities are now available in this one volume. Included are: "The Book of the Damned," "Lo!," "Wild Talents" and "New Lands." His writing style may be a bit different than what you're used to, but Fort's books are must-haves for anyone curious about the unknown and the unusual.
Miscellaneous
In 1881, a thunderstorm in Worcester, England, brought down tons of periwinkles and hermit crabs.
In November, 1996, a town in southern Tasmania was slimed! Several residents woke up on a Sunday morning after a night of violent thunderstorms to find a strange, white-clear jelly-like substance on their property. Apparently, it had rained either fish eggs or baby jellyfish.
A Korean fisherman, trolling off the coast of the Falkland Islands, was knocked unconscious by a single frozen squid that fell from the sky and konked him on the head.
In July, 2001, a red rain fell on Kerala, India. At first it was thought that a meteor was responsible for the strange-colored rain, but an analysis showed that the water was filled with fungal spores. Still, where did all of those red spores come from to be rained down in such concentration?
From about 1982 to 1986, kernels of corn have rained down on several houses in Evans, Colorado - tons of it, according to Gary Bryan, one of the residents. Oddly, there were no cornfields in the area that might account for the phenomenon.
In August, 2001, the Wichita, Kansas area experienced an unexplained rain of corn husks. The news report stated that "thousands of dried corn leaves fell over east Wichita - from about Central Avenue to 37th Street North, along Woodlawn Boulevard and on east - each about 20 to 30 inches long."
In 1877, several one-foot-long alligators fell on J. L. Smith's farm in South Carolina. They landed, unharmed, and started crawling around, reported The New York Times.
Perhaps the most bizarre report is one that, unfortunately, cannot be confirmed. It may be just the stuff of urban legend, but it's so weird and so amusing that had to be included. I'll leave it up to you to decide whether or not it's true.
Sometime around 1990, a Japanese fishing boat was sunk in the Sea of Okhotsk off the eastern coast of Siberia by a falling cow. When the crew of the wrecked ship were fished from the water, they told authorities that they had seen several cows falling from the sky, and that one of them crashed straight through the deck and hull. At first, the story goes, the fishermen were arrested for trying to perpetrate an insurance fraud, but were released when their story was verified. It seems that a Russian transport plane carrying stolen cattle was flying overhead. When the movement of the herd within the plane threw it off balance, the plane's crew, to avoid crashing, opened the loading bay at the tail of the aircraft and drove them out to fall into the water below. True story or hoax? One investigation traced the story back to a Russian television comedy series.
Personally, I think the story is the most preposterous.... Wait a minute... I think I just saw something large and black and white fall past my window. Is that mooing I hear?
[Bl.] Red water is not unheard of.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/moses/evidence/plagues.shtml
The pfisteria theory - one explanation of the first six plagues
In 1999 an environmental catastrophe happened in the town of New Burn, North Carolina. The residents woke up to find the waters of their river - the Neuse - had turned red. More than a billion fish died. People working near the river found that they were covered in sores.
The cause of this was found to be pollution. The pollution had come from a pig farm further up the river. Millions of gallons of pig-waste had found its way into the river causing a genetic mutation in a marine micro-organism called pfisteria; turning it from harmless into lethal. The river had been poisoned.
John Marr, an epidemiologist specialising in environmental disasters, believes pollution in ancient Egypt could have caused the first six plagues. Pfisteria caused the fish to die, thus turning the river red; the pollution would have driven the frogs onto the land, on land the frogs would die, causing an explosion of flies and lice. The flies could then have transmitted viral diseases to livestock, killing them.
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