Report: cells "from space" have unusual makeup

Sept. 8, 2008
Special to World Science

A lineage of odd microbes that may have crashed into Earth aboard a meteor
in 2001 seem to contain molecules not found in Earthly cells, two scientists
are reporting.

Although many remain skeptical over the remarkable claim of minuscule
extraterrestrial visitors, Godfrey Louis, head of the physics department at
Cochin University of Science and Technology in India, presented the findings
at a scientific conference in San Diego on Aug. 12.

The meeting was organized by SPIE, the International Society for Optical
Engineering. The acronym reflects its former name as Society of
Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers.

The microbes give off unsual sorts of fluorescence under specific lighting
conditions, which follow patterns never seen in normal cells, according to
Louis and Santhosh Kumar of Mahatma Gandhi University in India, co-authors
of the report. The likely explanation, they added, is that the particles
contain molecules not found in Earthly organisms.

Robert Karl Stonjek wrote:

Uh huh. What did they eat? What did they excrete? How can you kill
them?

On Sep 13, 10:18=A0pm, j...@gs.washington.edu wrote:

Anyone wanting to follow up on this is recommended to search for "Red
Rain" in Wikipedia, which leads to an article on this phenomenon.
Apparently the particles *do* contain DNA, because they are colored
with spores of terrestrial algae. The researchers Louis and Kumar,
mentioned in previous postings, are on their own (together with
Wickramasinghe) on this in their assertion of extraterrestrial origin