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Scientist: Mars colonists 'will become super-mutants but could die if they mate with Earthlings'
The Sun ^ | May 21, 2019 | Harry Pettit, Senior Digital Technology and Science Reporter

Posted on 05/21/2019 6:06:35 PM PDT by ETL

Full title:

Mars colonists ‘will become super-mutants with cancer-immune skin’ – but could die ‘if they mate with Earthlings’, scientist warns

THE FIRST humans on Mars will quickly become too fragile to have sex with.

That's according to one scientist, who reckons colonists will warp into super-mutants who'll keel over the moment they bonk an Earthling.

Nasa is keen to land humans on Mars in the 2030s with an eye on setting up a permanent Martian colony.

Settlers will have to survive suffocating temperatures and deadly radiation – an experience that may strip them of their humanity altogether, says Rice University professor Scott Solomon.

He told Inverse that colonists' DNA will rapidly mutate to help them ride out Mars's brutal conditions.

Over time, they'll develop cancer-proof skin to survive the extra solar radiation, and denser bones to cope with Mars's low-gravity conditions.

On top of this, inhabitants will be exposed to almost none of the bacteria and viruses found on Earth, effectively nullifying their immune systems.

According to Professor Solomon, who is an evolutionary biologist at Rice, it will only take Mars colonists two generations to become super-mutants.

"Evolution is faster or slower depending on how much of an advantage there is to having a certain mutation," Professor Solomon says.

"If a mutation pops up for people living on Mars, and it gives them a 50-percent survival advantage, that’s a huge advantage, right?

And that means that those individuals are going to be passing those genes on at a much higher rate than they otherwise would have."

He added that contact with humans may become deadly for Martians.

With no immune system, they'll quickly succumb to any illnesses or diseases carried by their human lovers.

These are all issues that Nasa will have to consider as it prepares to land man on the Moon by 2024, before heading to Mars in 2033.

The space agency is already pumping cash into research on the long-term effects of space travel.

One study in Germany has seen participants handed £14,000 to sit in bed and watch telly for two months.

Scientists are testing how prolonged periods of low-gravity during long-distance spaceflight affects the human body.


TOPICS: Astronomy; Chit/Chat; Science
KEYWORDS:
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1 posted on 05/21/2019 6:06:35 PM PDT by ETL
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2 posted on 05/21/2019 6:06:50 PM PDT by ETL (REAL Russia collusion! New Updates on Dem-Russia collusion via Ukraine ! Click ETL)
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To: ETL

Dumb article.


3 posted on 05/21/2019 6:07:57 PM PDT by ifinnegan (Democrats kill babies and harvest their organs to sell)
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To: ETL
Harry Pettit, Senior Digital Technology and Science Reporter

"I have a master's degree... in Science!"

4 posted on 05/21/2019 6:08:30 PM PDT by Steely Tom ([Seth Rich] == [the Democrat's John Dean])
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To: ETL

“Scientist”


5 posted on 05/21/2019 6:08:35 PM PDT by Teacher317 (We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men)
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6 posted on 05/21/2019 6:09:38 PM PDT by ETL (REAL Russia collusion! New Updates on Dem-Russia collusion via Ukraine ! Click ETL)
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To: ETL

I once mated with a super-mutant, and I’m OK. Mostly


7 posted on 05/21/2019 6:10:50 PM PDT by Rio
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To: ETL
click link for solution to supermutant problem.
8 posted on 05/21/2019 6:11:04 PM PDT by MrEdd (Caveat Emptor)
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To: ETL

Then they won’t be humans any more and it won’t be a colony. So what good is “establishing a colony on Mars”?


9 posted on 05/21/2019 6:11:20 PM PDT by I want the USA back (Islam, not a religion, a totalitarian political ideology aiming for world domination. -Wilders)
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To: ETL

“He told Inverse that colonists’ DNA will rapidly mutate to help them ride out Mars’s brutal conditions.”

Nope. Not how science actually is.

Too many semesters of genetics and physiology to agree with most anything this idiot projects.


10 posted on 05/21/2019 6:11:51 PM PDT by Blueflag (Res ipsa loquitur: non vehere est inermus)
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To: ETL

I must be a Martian. If I tried to
mate with a human now, it’d kill me.


11 posted on 05/21/2019 6:12:33 PM PDT by sparklite2 (Don't mind me. I'm just a contrarian.)
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To: ETL

GOT is over, so now all the attention seeking dweeb “scientists” start coming out of the woodwork.

Great...


12 posted on 05/21/2019 6:13:15 PM PDT by Darteaus94025 (Can't have a Liberal without a Lie)
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To: ETL

Wow! That’s a relief...


13 posted on 05/21/2019 6:13:19 PM PDT by SuperLuminal (Where is Sam Adams now that we desperately need him)
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To: Steely Tom

14 posted on 05/21/2019 6:14:08 PM PDT by DoodleBob (Gravity's waiting period is about 9.8 m/s^2)
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To: ETL

denser bones to cope with Mars’s low-gravity conditions.

Denser bones to cope with low-gravity conditions?

?????


15 posted on 05/21/2019 6:14:48 PM PDT by tet68 ( " We would not die in that man's company, that fears his fellowship to die with us...." Henry V.)
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To: ETL

Ridiculous.

Even if partially valid, the “mutations” he speaks of would have to accumulate over untold generations. A Martial colony after a thousand years? or, 100,000 years?


16 posted on 05/21/2019 6:15:37 PM PDT by C210N (You can vote your way into Socialism; but, you have to shoot your way out of it.)
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To: ETL

A Martian, a Venusian, and an Earthling, walked into a Mars bar...


17 posted on 05/21/2019 6:15:55 PM PDT by Songcraft
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To: ETL

If Man does ever make it to Mars and can establish some manner of colonies, reproduction is likely to be managed by doctors and social workers. Considering there will be a finite amount of food and atmospheric gases available.
Thus ‘direct bonking’ will not be a requirement in order to reproduce.

Think of the old song: “In The Year 2525, if Man is still
You won’t need no husband, You won’t need no wife.
You’ll pick your son, pick your daughter too,
From the bottom of a long glass tube!”


18 posted on 05/21/2019 6:16:50 PM PDT by lee martell
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To: ETL

Another waste of billions of tax dollars. We are $21 TRILLION in the hole now, so why is this boondoggle any different than thousands of others?


19 posted on 05/21/2019 6:19:50 PM PDT by txrefugee
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To: ETL

Dark, they were, and golden-eyed...


20 posted on 05/21/2019 6:19:54 PM PDT by A_perfect_lady ( Political correctness forbids discussing any negative outcomes of Left-wing ideology. -PMcL)
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