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Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

bbc.co.uk

31–40 of 47 posts

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#31
post #19

Panspermia[1] is not a new theory. This whole article is highly speculative. It might sound compelling, but we just know way too little to make any sort of prediction on this matter. Any real findings must come from actual data provided by probes and landers such as the Mars 2020 Rover[2] and the ExoMars[3] mission. [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia [2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_2020_rover_mission…

The only way to confirm it is once the asteroid minimg begins. Then it's a matter of time to find an asteroid from earth. Maybe it'll tale long but eventually they'll be able to analize what's left there.

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#32
post #15

The notion that an asteroid impact could launch life-bearing debris to escape velocity is not new. I remember it being mentioned in one of Lester Del Rey's juvenile science fiction books -- possibly "Outpost of Jupiter", which according to Wikipedia was first published in 1963.

The difference is that this models a specific impact to see whether it would work. That's a long long way from conclusive, of course, but it's a useful addition.

I agree. I just find it interesting that the base idea has been around so long -- longer in fact than the "asteroid killed the dinosaurs" theory.

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#33
post #4

I have this vision of dinosaur astronauts, clinging to the rock that has been ejected into space, on their way to Mars to establish a new life there. I have always found the pan-spermia theories interesting. It still doesn't answer the 'where first' question but it allows for many places to share similar lifeforms without requiring a recreation of an improbable event in all of them. Of course it would be really weird…

Panspermia only interests me in an intra-solar system context. I imagine the probability of ejected rocks from an asteroid impact in one solar system reaching a body in another solar system is significantly lower.

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#34
post #4

I have this vision of dinosaur astronauts, clinging to the rock that has been ejected into space, on their way to Mars to establish a new life there. I have always found the pan-spermia theories interesting. It still doesn't answer the 'where first' question but it allows for many places to share similar lifeforms without requiring a recreation of an improbable event in all of them. Of course it would be really weird…

So kind of like the stargate SG1 plot line where instead of the ancients spreading life across the universe using stargates you have meteros doing the work

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#35
post #4

I have this vision of dinosaur astronauts, clinging to the rock that has been ejected into space, on their way to Mars to establish a new life there. I have always found the pan-spermia theories interesting. It still doesn't answer the 'where first' question but it allows for many places to share similar lifeforms without requiring a recreation of an improbable event in all of them. Of course it would be really weird…

Panspermia only interests me in an intra-solar system context. I imagine the probability of ejected rocks from an asteroid impact in one solar system reaching a body in another solar system is significantly lower.

And I doubt the math would allow them to span galaxies.

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#36
post #4

I have this vision of dinosaur astronauts, clinging to the rock that has been ejected into space, on their way to Mars to establish a new life there. I have always found the pan-spermia theories interesting. It still doesn't answer the 'where first' question but it allows for many places to share similar lifeforms without requiring a recreation of an improbable event in all of them. Of course it would be really weird…

Given the right similar starting conditions in the DNA... It could be interesting.

What surprises me is that life can survive these trips. A rock ejected from the Earth would have to have tremendous heat during the escape velocity. Science is fascinating.

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#37

I don't believe this story! Why don't we find those rocks ejected during the impact on Moon?

Are you asking why we never found a small number of Earth rocks scattered over the entire surface of the Moon during a period of only a few hours total of lunar exploration? The answer should be obvious.

I agree that it could be due to limited lunar exploration. Having said that, my concern or thoughts is that, why we limited our exploration mission to moon? I have been looking for answers for a long time.

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you asking why we never found a small number of Earth rocks scattered over the entire surface of the Moon during a period of only a few hours total of lunar exploration? The answer should be obvious.

To be fair...the surface of Earth's moon has been much more extensive than just physical lunar surface exploration. It's also a fair question, have we seen evidence from this on our moon? And if not is it really because of the limited exploration or some other factors?

Thank you josefresco!

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you asking why we never found a small number of Earth rocks scattered over the entire surface of the Moon during a period of only a few hours total of lunar exploration? The answer should be obvious.

To be fair...the surface of Earth's moon has been much more extensive than just physical lunar surface exploration. It's also a fair question, have we seen evidence from this on our moon? And if not is it really because of the limited exploration or some other factors?

We're talking about a fairly small number of rocks scattered across an enormous surface. On the Moon it's even worse because the Earth rocks would simply be lying on top and amongst other rocks. There is no possibility to identify such things from orbit since the rock fragments, after impact, would typically be smaller than could be resolved by an orbital camera and proper identification involves detailed mineralogical and isotopic analyses that cannot be done remotely.

We can, however, be quite certain that Earth rocks have landed on the Moon, and Mars, and many other planetary bodies in our Solar System. We have conclusive evidence of meteorites on Earth that have come from Mars, the Moon, and Mercury. We know this because of their distinctive mineralogical and isotopic characteristics. For example, we have been able to extract trace amounts of atmospheric gases from bubbles within rocks suspected to have come from Mars and we found that they were a very precise match for the atmospheric composition of Mars. Given those facts, and given the fact that simulations of impacts and evolution of the orbits of impact ejecta from Earth should eventually cause a significant fraction of such objects to impact the Moon, Mars, and other planets I think it's a virtual certainty that they have done so.

Re: Dinosaur asteroid 'sent life to Mars'

#40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you asking why we never found a small number of Earth rocks scattered over the entire surface of the Moon during a period of only a few hours total of lunar exploration? The answer should be obvious.

I agree that it could be due to limited lunar exploration. Having said that, my concern or thoughts is that, why we limited our exploration mission to moon? I have been looking for answers for a long time.

I'm not sure what you mean. It ended up costing about a billion dollars per person to send someone to the Moon. And those are incremental costs. Few people thought that the costs of the moon program justified the expense of keeping it running.
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