I found this posted to slashdot; the original sourse is the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).
Visiting aliens may be the stuff of legend, but if a scientific team working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is right, we may be able to find extraterrestrial life even before it leaves its home planet—by looking for left- (or right-) handed light.
The technique … could allow spaceborne instruments to see a telltale sign that life may have influenced a landscape: a preponderance of molecules that have a certain “chirality,” or handedness. A right-handed molecule has the same composition as its left-handed cousin, but their chemical behavior differs. Because many substances critical to life favor a particular handedness…chirality might reveal life’s presence at great distances.
Why do the scientists think this is a viable technique?
“If the surface had just a collection of random chiral molecules, half would go left, half right,” Germer says. “But life’s self-assembly means they all would go one way. It’s hard to imagine a planet’s surface exhibiting handedness without the presence of self assembly, which is an essential component of life.”
Chirality sensing is possible from great distances – in theory. The scientists responsible for this work have apparently already tested a prototype sensor. But it’s not ready to be pointed at an exoplanet yet.
With a new exoplanet seemingly being identified every week, a straightforward tool that presumes little about the chemical makeup of a life form will likely be the ultimate tipping point in locating extraterrestrial life.
How elegantly simple yet powerful!
No comments:
Post a Comment