Nasa to hold conference on Alien Life. Part 3 - Details

So Nasa announcement happened. It wasn't what i and others expected.

A little over hyped I think though it is very interesting news. The hype seemed to be heading more towards definite proof rather than just a increase to one of the coefficients of the Drake equation.

Scientists have found a bacterium thriving in a heavily poisonous lake. This lake has a high concentration of arsenic, which would normally be deadly to bacteria. This clever little bacterium actually uses arsenic as a building block, it uses arsenic in several of its cell structures where normal life (me, you, that tree and that fish.) would use phosphorus. Most interestingly the bacterium uses the arsenic in its “DNA”.

The scientists have been asked weather this is evidence of life’s adaptability or of a 2nd genesis (not the Phil Collins Band.) Is this a bacterium that has adapted to a high arsenic low phosphorus environment by using arsenic instead in place of phosphorus, or is this bacterium part of a shadow Biosphere? I.e. is the bacterium a completely separate unrelated form of life that has grown alongside ours?

The scientist are reluctant to commit, as usual. All they say the finding means is that life can exist without one of the elements we previously thought essential for it. Which is pretty huge.

If life now needs Carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, (phosphorus or arsenic) and sulphur, what else can it swap-out. Carbon for silicon? Sulphur for Selenium? It means the chance of life existing and thriving elsewhere in the universe just got a hell of a lot more likely.