Stop-it! The conspiritorialists will be all over us!

Arrrrrgh!

"I hope they didn't find the mutilated corpses of teeny tiny little people buried in the aerogel... "

No... they found MEDFLIES.

A far more chilling possibility. The Andromeda Strain would be nothing by comparison.

(You know, come to think of it, in that novel the germ was brought back to Earth by PRECISELY this kind of mission, albeit one in Earth orbit. It's a mark of the scientific ignorance that frequently lurks underneath Michael Crichton's facade that he'd think the military might consider such a mission economically worthwhile to look for new germ weapons.)

Could it be "tar" found in the particles?
The interstellar dust collector on Stardust had already found complex organic tar-like molecules with its CIDA mass spectrometer:

Tarlike macro-molecules detected in 'stardust'
MAX-PLANCK INSTITUTE NEWS RELEASE
Posted: April 29, 2000
"It is the size of these molecular fragments with nuclear masses of up to 2000 (water e.g. has 18 such units) which surprised us as much as the seemingly absence of any mineral constituents", explains Dr. Kissel of the Garching-based Max-Planck-Institut für extraterrestrische Physik. "Only organic molecules can reach those sizes". The largest molecules found in space so far are the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) which reach masses of a few hundred mass units.
"The details of the mass spectra measured with CIDA show that the molecules of the interstellar dust must have about 10 percent of nitrogen and/or oxygen in addition to hydrogen and carbon. This means that these cannot be pure PAHs, which are planar, but are especially due to the nitrogen extend into all three spacial directions."
http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0004/29tarstardust/

These "tar-like" particles are presumed to be interstellar because of their direction and high-speed. However, it is notable that the Giotto spacecraft also detected "tar-like" materials on the surface of comet Halley. Perhaps the CIDA detected particles arose from jets from comets that could explain their high speeds and unexpected directions.
On Earth actual tar is formed from combustion or decay of living material. If these Stardust grains are found to contain true tar that would suggest they arose from past life in space.


c.f.,

Newsgroups: sci.astro, sci.astro.seti, rec.arts.sf.science, sci.bio.misc
From: Robert Clark <rgcl...@my-deja.com>
Date: 2000/04/29
Subject: Re: Tarlike macro-molecules detected in 'stardust' (Forwarded)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.astro.s...42528d44bba448a


Bob Clark

Why do you think tar can come only from decay of living organisms?

Should we re-name this thread "tardust"?

Is This Life?

The Scientist January 2006

*************************

In the past decade, individual labs
have met 10 of 12 proposed
requirements for creating a
"protocell," but in quite different
ways. With only two steps remaining,
they might achieve a synthetic
organism within this...

http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedire...sID=5245&m=7610

A couple of Wild-2 maps. The first is a reprojection of two images using an ellipsoid shape model - needs improving. North at the top, simple cylindrical projection (modified from an earlier post):

Click to view attachment

The second is a DEM made from the plate model recently put up on the PDS small bodies website. Same projection. Darker areas are lower. The south is smooth because it wasn't seen.

Click to view attachment

Phil

Edited a bit later: I don't really trust this DEM very much. I'll have to think about it. It is a faithful rendition of their model, but I think the model could be improved a lot.

In nature, actual tar only arises from the breakdown of prior living matter.
It would be like finding petroleum oil in space. In nature, this arises only over long periods from the breakdown of prior living material.

Tar
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tar

La Brea Tar Pits.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Brea_Tar_Pits


- Bob

Hold the phone. We assume tar on Earth is all byproduct of life processes. We can also make it synthetically, and there is no reason to assume there are not any natural synthetic processes that predate our own.

Secondly, this news release was in 2000 - the visible particles from star dust appear to be - on first blush - minerals, not tars. Could it be the particle sizes were too great to be detected by the in situ analyzers?

True we can make it synthetically. But as I said that's not the way it occurs in nature. Of course you could say it was formed artificially by someone else in space. ;-)
Actually, if you look at the Wikipedia article, even when produced in industry you still need petroleum products or coal derivatives to produce it, which themselves arise from prior living material.



- Bob Clark

There is Tommy Gold's theory in the Deep Hot Biosphere:

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.07/gold_pr.html

I have never read anything to suggest that they think the complex organics in comet dust -- or in interstellar dust -- might even conceivably be biologically produced. (Now, on the other hand, it may have been a useful precursor to the appearance of terrestrial life by seeding the ancient Earth...)

Contrary to all the wild speculation, I think the problem might be finding something interesting to say in a press briefing. They have already said what can be learned from the samples, no need to call a briefing to repeat that. Now they have to wait til there is something new to say.

Capsules From the Cosmos: Stardust Success Could Signal More Sample Missions

http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/06012...e_capsules.html

When the Stardust capsule blazed its way through Earth's atmosphere to a
parachute landing in Utah earlier this month, the event was a preview of
extraterrestrial attractions to come.

Well, clearly, you're not going to have a mainstream scientist proclaim life in comets, prior to having samples to look at.
I expect at least the interstellar dust collected to contain tar-like organics. It will be interesting to find out how complex those organics are.
However, at least some of the Wild 2 dust collected appears to be mineral:

Dissecting Stardust
"The holes are carrot-shaped, with a large entry hole that tapers to a point. The first photograph of a cometary particle shows it residing in the very tip of the tunnel it drilled, like the dot of an exclamation point. The particle is only 11 microns across, and appears to be a transparent mineral grain.
"Scientifically, that's great, because there's been lots of discussion of whether comets contain minerals or glass," says Brownlee."
http://www.astrobio.net/news/article1841.html



- Bob Clark

Could the dark material on Iapetus be the same kind of material found on comets?

Is it an organic "tar"?

Wow!



- http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/news/status/060125.html - Stardust Status Report / Jan 25

http://www.nationalacademies.org/headlines/20060126.html

Interstellar Dust Returned to Earth for Study

By Lisa Pickoff-White

January 26 - NASA's Stardust spacecraft traveled more than 2.88 billion miles, over seven years, to bring back samples of some of the oldest materials in the solar system. Inside the canister is a collection of grains of comet and interstellar dust that will be sent to investigators worldwide for research.

These materials consist of ancient pre-solar interstellar grains and cometary dust. Analysis of the celestial specks is expected to yield important insights into the formation of the solar system. The spacecraft collected the comet remnants by flying within 149 miles of the comet Wild 2 in January 2004 and collected interstellar dust as it traveled throughout the solar system.

The same week as Stardust's arrival, NASA launched New Horizons, the first spacecraft to explore Pluto and its moon Charon, an area of great interest to scientists exploring the origins of the solar system. Recently, scientists discovered two possible new moons of Pluto using the Hubble Space Telescope.

A National Research Council report, New Frontiers in the Solar System: An Integrated Exploration Strategy, examines the nature of contemporary solar system exploration and why it remains a scientifically compelling activity today. It makes several recommendations for NASA's space exploration agenda over the next decade, prioritizing missions within different size classes, including collecting fragments of a comet and further exploration of Pluto and the Kuiper belt region Assessment of Options for Extending the Life of the Hubble Space Telescope: Final Report recommends that to ensure continuation of the extraordinary scientific output of the Hubble Space Telescope and to prepare for its eventual de-orbiting, NASA should send a space shuttle mission, not a robotic one for repairs.

New Frontiers in the Solar System: An Integrated Exploration Strategy 2003

http://books.nap.edu/catalog/10432.html

Assessment of Options for Extending the Life of the Hubble Space Telescope: Final Report 2005

http://books.nap.edu/catalog/11169.html

Space Studies Board

http://www7.nationalacademies.org/ssb/

Other Resources:

NASA’s Stardust Mission Page

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/stardust/main/index.html

Just to make things clear: organic "tar" does not need a biological origin, in a comet's case all you need is froze organics like CH4, NH3, CO2, H2O and radiation (heat or ionizing) and the radicals and ions formed will polymerize into a assorted mess of complex organic molecules including long chained hydrocarbons (tar). If there is something more in the sludge like prebiotic life that is a very interesting possible, but the prebiotic life would come from the tar, not the tar being a result of the proto-life.

That looks like wallpaper material to me.

Jack

Lovely article, though I still revere Arthur Holmes!

Gold was right to criticise geologists for their adherence to 'fashions', but sadly was no better himself in some ways at avoiding such pitfalls. And even when wildly wrong he was entertaining, unlike the WWW-based contrarians and conspiriologists of today, who are merely appalling...

Bob Shaw

It would seem to me that C-14 or other isotop ratios would be important in figuring out whether or not a given batch of earth-tar is biological. I wonder, about oil-shale and oil sands. Are we reasonably certain all earthly tars are biological?

I also wonder if the large particles sizes messed up the in-situ analysis. When we try to run GCMS in dirty environments, we have to take special measure to make certain the rapidly plugging filters do not adversely affect the flow rate and skew the distribution.

Great film of Stardust's return to Earth, complete with subtitles:

http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/anim/stardust_reentrya.mov

Has anyone else noticed that a faint meteor actually streaks briefly at around one minute into the clip?! It appears in the upper left quadrant of the frame, shooting downwards.

Pretty cool, shows just how much faster meteors are than even the "fastest-ever" returning human-made capsule.

Stardust placed into hibernation mode.

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2006-016

Rakhir

Stardust Status Report
January 31, 2006
The pace of sample processing has ramped up. Six particles have been removed from the aerogel.

http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/news/status/060131.html

------------------------------------

Scientists Begin Intense Study of Stardust Particles

Work is already beginning on analyzing the pristine grains the spacecraft brought to Earth.

http://planetary.org/news/2006/0131_Scient...e_Study_of.html

Image of the Day: Flash and Burn!

http://www.space.com/imageoftheday/image_of_day_060201.html

The Earthward plunge of NASA's Stardust sample return capsule is captured by
Bruce Fischer of the Ogden Astronomical Society in Utah.

Seeing stardust: New image shows speck of comet dust from NASA mission
UC Berkeley News
February 1, 2006

Stardust was a superb mission ... thanks for the photo-link ljk4-1 !

By The Way did UC Berkeley already open a website for enthusiasts helping to do some basic research on the samples ?

Details at: http://stardustathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/

tty

Probably the most beautiful image from the reentry (hey, there is Orion constellation on the left!).
Looking at this, there is a considerations that took my breath away: perhaps, almost 4 billions years ago, a similar event sparked life on our planets and now we reproduced it!
Thanks to Fischer and all NH team!

http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/news/status/060207.html

Stardust Status Report
February 7, 2006

Dr. Peter Tsou
Stardust Deputy Principal Investigator

It has been 3 weeks since landing!

Based upon an initial X-Ray Tomography (XT) examination of the
quickstone - a particle track removed from an aerogel fragment with an
ultrasonic blade - the bifurcated track (2 tracks as shown in Photo 1)
is now determined to be "pentafurcated" (5 tracks) since three more
smaller tracks have been identified. With the XT, we will have a solid
digital model of the quickstone and be able to view the entire track
from all directions on a computer screen. This is especially important
in identifying sizes of grains scattered along the track (down to 0.1
microns) and their precise locations.

On January 19th, 2006, we released the first picture of a particle
(shown in Photo 2) taken in situ of the aerogel. We have now made a
keystone of the track (shown in Photo 3). The particle and its track
removed from an aerogel fragment with an automated keystone system. This
keystone can now be conveniently transported and placed into various
analytical instruments to study its properties.

The Preliminary Examination Team will be gathered in the Stardust
Cleanroom on February 9 to begin the second cell extraction cycle. The
Team has looked at some of the removed small particles and found the
entry fragments are melted more so than the particles further down the
track. This was as expected. The Team will remove some of the larger
particles to determine how well the grains had survived. The Team will
also remove a few grains from the largest tracks to determine their
compositions.

Images

Photo 1: Aerogel slice removed with an ultrasonic blade, showing
particle tracks.

Photo 2: Comet particle in aerogel.

Photo 3: A "keystone" cut of aerogel showing particle and track.

Lisse et.al. will report on their detection of carbonate and clay from Deep Impact at the 37th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in March:

Spitzer Space Telescope Observations of the Nucleus and Dust of Deep Impact Target Comet 9P/Tempel 1.
C.M. Lisse1 and the Deep Impact Spitzer Science Team. 1 JHU-APL,
11100 Johns Hopkins Road, Laurel, MD 20723 ****@jhuapl.edu.
Lunar and Planetary Science XXXVII (2006) 1960.pdf
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2006/pdf/1960.pdf

They have submitted this for publication in Science.


- Bob Clark

Just saw this on Uplink.space.com:

Published online: 13 February 2006
A comet's tale.
...
"Whatever it is, it's weird"
After fiddling around to improve the picture slightly, Kearsley starts a more intensive scan of the grain that will reveal its chemical make-up. As the analysis comes through, there are cries of surprise. "Whatever it is, it's weird," says Bland.
"The team agonize over the decision to make another scan to get more accurate results, but Kearsley is worried about "frying" the sample. "These grains have had a long journey and rather a lot of money spent on them," he cautions.
"They can see that just a few minutes exposure to high-energy electrons has changed the structure of some of the epoxy surrounding the grain, so they finally decide that the initial results are so astonishing that they should contact Mike Zolensky at Johnson Space Center immediately to tell him about the find, and wait for further instructions. Zolensky is in charge of the preliminary analysis of the samples, and is collating all the information from these first tests."
http://www.nature.com/news/2006/060213/full/060213-2.html



Bob Clark

Wacky crystals?

Should we start a pool on what they are? quartz? Bucky Balls? Diamonds? zirconium hexaflouride?

It's Pop Rocks.