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San Francisco, 10:00 AM
Sat Nov 28
16 posts in the last 24 hours

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  • posts about #rosetta more →

    Building Blocks of Life Found on a Comet

    Europeans Play Asteroids — For Real!

    Nationalist Robots Swarm To Conquer Space
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    Dsmvwl  Admin  Promote to frontpage Approve user Ban user ×
    Image of Anekanta - killed by a cacodemon Anekanta - killed by a cacodemon
    08/18/09

    In reply to Building Blocks of Life Found on a Comet
    Okay, but how did the amino acids get on the comet? Do they just form in space? It sounds like just about any icy or watery ball of rock floating in space can have potentially life generating compounds form on it.
     Reply
    Anekanta - killed by a cacodemon was starred Anekanta - killed by a cacodemon was unstarred
    Image of The_Sporean_Bob The_Sporean_Bob
    08/18/09

    @Anekanta: pretty much. If you have all the base chemicals in the mixture, as well as the right heat and ph, amino acids, DNA, all that good stuff does just form, thanks to electromagnetic forces at the atomic level, and Brownian Motion...
     Reply
    Stephen Goldmeier promoted this comment The_Sporean_Bob was starred The_Sporean_Bob was unstarred
    Image of firstofnormalin firstofnormalin
    08/18/09

    @Anekanta:
    Yup. But not on a solid body. There's clouds of carbon compounds floating in interstellar space (Can you say CHON? Did I read Gateway last week?) and spectrographic analysis shows radiation will make the molecules link up. And it's not hard to get some of the molecular rings (2-ring Vinyls) to open up and attract side chains, creating amino acids. There was an article in Scientific American about pre-biotic amino acid synthesis a few years ago.
     Reply
    Stephen Goldmeier promoted this comment firstofnormalin was starred firstofnormalin was unstarred
    Image of gorehound gorehound
    08/18/09

    In reply to Building Blocks of Life Found on a Comet
    good news post.i love science.
     Reply
    gorehound was starred gorehound was unstarred
    Image of BadUncle BadUncle
    08/18/09

    In reply to Building Blocks of Life Found on a Comet
    Comets get the best acid.
     Reply
    BadUncle was starred BadUncle was unstarred
    Image of Rocketknight Rocketknight
    08/18/09

    In reply to Building Blocks of Life Found on a Comet
    Does this mean that comets can contain primitive forms of life or is it literally just the amino acids in no particular configuration?
     Reply
    Rocketknight was starred Rocketknight was unstarred
    Image of ThisDudeRufus ThisDudeRufus
    08/18/09

    @VergessenHeld: If I read it correctly there were just some amino acids. Trust me, if there were little bacteria the news could be covered in "ZOMG Alien Bugz!"
     Reply
    ThisDudeRufus was starred ThisDudeRufus was unstarred
    Image of Rocketknight Rocketknight
    08/18/09

    @ThisDudeRufus: I thought it was. Just wanted it clear.
     Reply
    Rocketknight was starred Rocketknight was unstarred
    Image of Klebert L. Hall Klebert L. Hall
    08/19/09

    @VergessenHeld: It means that bthat might be somewhat more likely, but there's no evidence as of yet.
    -Kle.
     Reply
    Klebert L. Hall was starred Klebert L. Hall was unstarred
    Image of transbastard transbastard
    08/18/09

    In reply to Building Blocks of Life Found on a Comet
    Declaring amino acids and proteins equivalent is rather bold - don't do that. Lots of amino acids do not a protein make! The best you'd get would be a polypeptide.

    Proteins can do stuff, which calls for a specific sequence of amino acids, and for a mechanism to push the protein into a functional shape.
     Reply
    Roklimber promoted this comment transbastard was starred transbastard was unstarred
    Image of Gann Gann
    08/18/09

    In reply to Building Blocks of Life Found on a Comet
    They found legos on a comet?
     Reply
    Gann was starred Gann was unstarred
    Image of RandomFrequentFlierDent RandomFrequentFlierDent
    08/18/09

    @Gann: Please, everyone knows Meccano make up the building blocks of life.
     Reply
    RandomFrequentFlierDent was starred RandomFrequentFlierDent was unstarred
    Image of Evil Tortie's Mom: R.O.A.C.H. Evil Tortie's Mom: R.O.A.C.H.
    08/18/09

    @RandomFrequentFlierDent: Those aren't blocks. Gann's right, it's Lego.
     Reply
    Evil Tortie's Mom: R.O.A.C.H. was starred Evil Tortie's Mom: R.O.A.C.H. was unstarred
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