Advances Tword Discovering Life On Other Planets

Advances Tword Discovering Life On Other Planets

Source Link: www.telegraph.co.uk

By analysing the faint glow of one of these alien worlds they have found tentative evidence that suggests the presence of chemicals which play a role in one theory of how life began on Earth.

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I saw a similar article on BBC World. Fascinating stuff, I really liked that in the BBC article the scientists responsible stated that it just goes to show that they have to drastically rethink where they would expect life to form and cease being earth like life-centric; because this would seem to blow it out of the water.

I remember reading that one of the two planets had a tremendous amount of silica in the atmosphere, for years I have always wondered if a Silicate as opposed to a Carbon based life form is feasible.

The Carbon based life form is of course an earth-centric idea, it is what we understand. But not necessarily all that is out there.

Baphomet,
I have hear the possibility of life forming based on silica instead of carbon also. It has mostly been the stuff of science fiction. But in this case is it great they have measured enough of the light to make a statement of what the atmosphere is made of. At this point however I think they can still say no life as we know it.

No no, I did not mean I think their is life on said planet, just that such high levels of silica on a planet so distant (close?) spells good for the possibility of sentient silicate based life somewhere in the universe.

I just really like this find because it teaches scientist to stop looking solely within the limits of humanity. If that made sense.

Silicon based life is entirely possible, as Carbon is in the same group (carbon group) as silicon on the periodic table and has similar properties.

Problem is, silicon requires more energy to bond with other elements (I think this is right...), so a higher temp is required for such "silicon life" to exist.

Apart from that, I don't know of any other impedement that would prohibit silicon based life. I do think I remember reading somewhere that Silicon life would likely be more chrystalline in nature, but I don't know how much basis this has in fact...

Stumason,
Everything you say does make sence to me for what ever that is worth. Maby some one else will chime in and confirm everything.
Thanks for your post.