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Lichen Can Survive in Space: Space Station Research Sheds Light On Origin of Life
Science Daily ^ | 23 JUNE 2012 | reprinted from materials provided by European Space Agency

Posted on 06/24/2012 12:18:06 PM PDT by onedoug

...When astronauts venture on a spacewalk, hours are spent preparing protective suits to survive the hostile conditions. No effort was made to protect the bacteria, seeds, lichen and algae attached to the outside of the Space Station, however.

....

Lichen have proven to be tough cookies -- back on Earth, some species continue to grow normally.

(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: abiogenesis; bettersunscreens; lichen; lifesorigins; space
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I've been interested in the origins of life for some time, so this seemed very interesting to me. However, evidence for this from meteorites has only yielded prebiotic materials with the controversial possible exception of Allan Hills 84001.

This latest information though, would seem to indicate mateorite transfer to Earth as a strengthened possibility.

1 posted on 06/24/2012 12:18:14 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: onedoug

I’m lichen it!


2 posted on 06/24/2012 12:36:36 PM PDT by Lazamataz (People who resort to Godwin's Law are just like Hitler.)
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To: onedoug

“I’ve been interested in the origins of life for some time, so this seemed very interesting to me.”

If you are that interested I suggest that you read Genesis.

The world-renowned crusader for Darwinism and atheism, Prof. Richard Dawkins, states:

‘We have seen that living things are too improbable and too beautifully “designed” to have come into existence by chance.’

http://creation.com/is-there-really-a-god-how-would-you-answer


3 posted on 06/24/2012 1:33:53 PM PDT by Kartographer ("We mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.")
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To: Kartographer

I read Genesis every year by virtue of the Torah cycle, and have no problem at all relating it with Robert Hazen’s “Genesis: The Scientific Quest for Life’s Origins”.

God turns up in the universe’s most fascinating places: all of it.


4 posted on 06/24/2012 1:44:19 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: onedoug

The only thing I got out of it is that lichen can survive in space for a certain amount of time. Anything beyond that is just speculation.


5 posted on 06/24/2012 1:45:49 PM PDT by microgood
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To: Kartographer

It’s all very simple. Live can live in and on rocks ~ both fungal and bacterial life forms (which are incredibly different), and that means that given 13 billion years to work with, life could have traveled quite a long way to just about everywhere.


6 posted on 06/24/2012 1:47:41 PM PDT by muawiyah
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To: microgood

On one of the space pings, someone figured out that our Voyager spacecraft, launched in the ‘70’s, would take just short of 100K years to reach Alpha Centari, the closest star outside of our solar system at present speed had they been aimed for an intercept course.

I find it hard to believe anything would survive the time, vacuum, cold and radiation for anything approaching that amount of time.


7 posted on 06/24/2012 2:04:42 PM PDT by Clay Moore (The heart of the wise inclines to the right, but the heart of a fool to the left. Ecclesiastes 10:2)
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To: Clay Moore

Mhmmm. Until life gets created out of nothing (impossible) in a science lab, you can chalk all of this up to impotent speculation. Real science is based upon observation, can be duplicated, and is refutable. Anything and EVERYTHING related to a time before we can observe, and have no record of, is pure fabrication, a big, fat, whopping lie, scientifically. This mumbo jumbo, and all other theories of evolution are mere scripture from the liberal church of the godless.


8 posted on 06/24/2012 2:35:11 PM PDT by JDW11235 (http://www.thirty-thousand.org/ AND "The fat, spoiled, complacent kid is going on a diet." -Unkus)
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To: onedoug

They might survive space but no way they’d live through two magazines of standing.45 silver rounds


9 posted on 06/24/2012 3:31:28 PM PDT by Vendome (Don't take life so seriously, you won't live thnrough it anyway)
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To: onedoug

If Earth life can survive in space, so can alien life; & the origins of life on Earth & the Universe could be far, far away.


10 posted on 06/24/2012 4:10:17 PM PDT by Mister Da (The mark of a wise man is not what he knows, but what he knows he doesn't know!)
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To: onedoug
n contrast, the space samples endured the full power of the Sun's rays. The samples were insulated somewhat by the Space Station but still had to cope with temperatures changing from -12ºC to +40ºC over 200 times as they orbited Earth. Wow, they survived in temperatures of ten degrees Fahrenheit to 104 degrees Fahrenheit. I would like to read the paper this piece was written about.
11 posted on 06/24/2012 4:13:49 PM PDT by Sawdring
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To: JDW11235

Nothing comes from nothing.

I once assumed that nothing had preceded life’s reproduction. That is, that it had occured de novo, spontaneously with the onset of life. Now however, I suspect that the essential patterns were already laid out, i.e., “tried” if you will, by the replication, and even evolution, of several types of prebiotic molecules.(Ref. Hazen, #4 above)

Quite a few of these molecules figure prominantly in later biological sequencing of RNA and DNA, as the most prominant.

Given the sophistication of organic chemistry at this level, I’d even venture as to wonder whether God was working it out in His own “mind”.

It’s very compelling to wonder...at least for me. And I think God would understand and appreciate humanity trying to reason it out too.


12 posted on 06/24/2012 4:36:30 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: Sawdring

I’ve got to admit that I was a little disappointed not to see the lichen experiments referenced in the paper the article cited, although the molecular sequences cited are still interesting.

A little further down of the same Science Daily page is a link to an article “Tiny Animals Exposed To Outer Space”. As it’s evidently from 2007 though, I suspect they didn’t fare too well. It will be interesting to dig up something on this, as I’ll try to do.


13 posted on 06/24/2012 4:51:42 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: muawiyah; onedoug

May I suggest two books?

Michael Denton entitled: Evolution: A Theory in Crisis

Michael Behe book entitled: Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution


14 posted on 06/24/2012 5:11:41 PM PDT by Kartographer ("We mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.")
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To: onedoug
um... I think any lichen attached to anything would burn up entering the atmosphere.

And plus this silly explanation doesn't explain the origin of life... it's just a cop out by saying it must have started elsewhere.

15 posted on 06/24/2012 5:12:56 PM PDT by TexasFreeper2009 (Obama lied .. the economy died.)
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To: Mister Da

Personally, I think that Earth life began here. Yet even were it true that life began elsewhere, we’d still be compelled to ask, how and why? But I don’t doubt that the chemistry for life is ubiquitous and that at least “simple” biology could be too.


16 posted on 06/24/2012 5:13:56 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: TexasFreeper2009

I supect the panels would have been re-stored in the returning spacecraft.


17 posted on 06/24/2012 5:17:47 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: Kartographer

I’ve read them. And I’m using the term rather loosely. I know there are a lot of specific issues involved and don’t necessarily go along with all of them without question.


18 posted on 06/24/2012 5:21:54 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: JDW11235
Still fun to speculate and I'm not about to budge an inch in the face of any bluenose baloney.

We already know there are bacteria buried in rocks deep within the earth. Their metabolism is so slow they could live tens of millions of years without running out of their available nutrition (from the rocks).

Evolution is a totally different story. It probably doesn't work like anyone has yet imagined. Odds are good we'll figure out how to tap into it soon and adjust genomes to eliminate genetic disease AND all unapproved changes.

19 posted on 06/24/2012 5:23:21 PM PDT by muawiyah
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To: onedoug
The first flaw in Darwinian Evolution is the postulate that we have a common ancestor.

Actually, we don't need to have a common ancestor if life spirals in from outerspace in all directions all the time.

20 posted on 06/24/2012 5:28:42 PM PDT by muawiyah
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