Jupiter’s Moon Europa Has Enough Oxygen For Life
Posted by admin | Filed under NASA, Science
Jupiter’s Moon Europa Has Enough Oxygen For Life
October 16th, 2009
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A model of Europa’s interior, including a global ocean. If a 100 kilometer-deep ocean existed below the Europan ice shell, it would be 10 times deeper than any ocean on Earth and would contain twice as much water as Earth’s oceans and rivers combined. Credit: NASA/JPL
New research suggests that there is plenty of oxygen available in the subsurface ocean of Europa to support oxygen-based metabolic processes for life similar to that on Earth. In fact, there may be enough oxygen to support complex, animal-like organisms with greater oxygen demands than microorganisms.
The global ocean on Jupiter’s moon Europa contains about twice the liquid water of all the Earth’s oceans combined. New research suggests that there may be plenty of oxygen available in that ocean to support life, a hundred times more oxygen than previously estimated.
The chances for life there have been uncertain, because Europa’s ocean lies beneath several miles of ice, which separates it from the production of oxygen at the surface by energetic charged particles (similar to cosmic rays). Without oxygen, life could conceivably exist at hot springs in the ocean floor using exotic metabolic chemistries, based on sulfur or the production of methane. However, it is not certain whether the ocean floor actually would provide the conditions for such life.
Therefore a key question has been whether enough oxygen reaches the ocean to support the oxygen-based metabolic process that is most familiar to us. An answer comes from considering the young age of Europa’s surface. Its geology and the paucity of impact craters suggests that the top of the ice is continually reformed such that the current surface is only about 50 million years old, roughly 1% of the age of the solar system.
Richard Greenberg of the University of Arizona has considered three generic resurfacing processes: gradually laying fresh material on the surface; opening cracks which fill with fresh ice from below; and disrupting patches of surface in place and replacing them with fresh material. Using estimates for the production of oxidizers at the surface, he finds that the delivery rate into the ocean is so fast that the oxygen concentration could exceed that of the Earth’s oceans in only a few million years. Greenberg presented his findings at the 41st meeting of the American Astronomical Society’s Division for Planetary Sciences now under way in Fajardo, Puerto Rico.
Greenberg says that the concentrations of oxygen would be great enough to support not only microorganisms, but also “macrofauna”, that is, more complex animal-like organisms which have greater oxygen demands. The continual supply of oxygen could support roughly 3 billion kilograms of macrofauna, assuming similar oxygen demands to terrestrial fish.
The good news for the question of the origin of life is that there would be a delay of a couple of billion years before the first surface oxygen reached the ocean. Without that delay, the first pre-biotic chemistry and the first primitive organic structures would be disrupted by oxidation. Oxidation is a hazard unless organisms have evolved protection from its damaging effects. A similar delay in the production of oxygen on Earth was probably essential for allowing life to get started here.
Richard Greenberg is the author of the recent book “Unmasking Europa: The Search for Life on Jupiter’s Ocean Moon”, which offers a comprehensive picture of Europa for the general reader.
Source: American Astronomical Society, via Astrobio.
Tags: Alien, chemistry, conditions, Europa, Ice, JPL, Jupiter, Life, liquid, microorganisms, moon, NASA, Ocean, Oxygen, Sulfur
Increase Vibration, Change Your Life
Posted by admin | Filed under Spiritual, psychic
Did you know that you can achieve your dreams using mind power or thought energy enhanced and strengthened with the natural energy of plant extracts, meditation, and affirmations? The life force energy of the blood of the plant can help you focus and amplify the energy of your thoughts to better communicate with your inner self, connecting with the creative power of the Universe. Numerous studies and diagnostic procedures provide scientific validation of the existence of measurable energy radiating from essential oils, thoughts, and emotions.
Physicists have proven that everything in the universe that appears solid is actually composed of swirling molecules. Einstein’s equation E = mc2 states that all matter is energy. These molecules are vibrating at different frequencies. Therefore all matter, including our bodies and entire life force, is a standing wave of pulsating energy. The vibrational frequency of this pulsating energy (the number of oscillations per second) is measured in Hertz, named after the nineteenth-century German physicist Heinrich Rudolph Hertz (1857–1894). As a Hertzian wave is generated and travels out from its source, the wave transfers energy to the objects through which it passes. This is one of the reasons that a happy and confident person walking into a room has a positive effect on the people present. His or her high vibration has an uplifting impact on everyone within its reach.
On the basis of the knowledge of the different frequencies of energy that can be measured emanating from the human body, a lot can be determined about our states of health, both physical and emotional. One of the most common diagnostic tools is the electrocardiogram (EKG). The electrical energy coming from the heart can give doctors information about whether the heart is functioning properly. The measurement of the beating heart’s electrical energy is actually vibrational medical analysis in its most basic form.
Dr. David Hawkins concluded from a 20-year study of kinesiologic calibrations that a person’s mental state can have a profound effect on the condition of his or her body. He created an arbitrary scale that mapped the energy of human consciousness. Any state, attitude, or emotion that causes a person to vibrate at a frequency below 200 on the Hawkins scale weakens the body, and from 200 to 1,000, strengthens it. He determined the lowest emotional vibration rate to be shame. A shameful thought weakens the person. Higher on the scale, but below 200, are guilt, apathy, grief, fear and anxiety, craving, anger, and hate. Love, joy, and peace move up the scale, with enlightenment at the top in the 700 to 1,000 range.
Clearly our objective should be to experience these higher vibrational emotions in order to maintain optimum health and let go of uncomfortable negative emotions and limiting thought patterns. Not only can our mental states affect the conditions of our bodies, they can also affect the achievement of our goals and determine the kind of life experiences we attract. The natural energy surrounding us can be used to change our personal lives, increase our businesses, or attract a soul mate.
When the highest and fastest frequencies replace lower and slower frequencies, they eradicate problems of many kinds. With a little effort you can increase your vibration, transform your emotional state, and change your life. You can create a conscious healing partnership between you, your higher self, divine intelligence, and the creative energy of the Universe.
The concept of vibrational healing utilizes the Universal Life Force to maintain balance within the energy field of the human body. This energy field can be modified, balanced, and enhanced to attract unlimited abundance, prosperity, and inner peace through meditation, affirmations, conscious intention, and the inhalation of pure, therapeutic-grade essential oils.
Clinical research shows that essential oils, containing the life force energy of plants, have the highest frequency of any substance known to man (including food or herbs), creating an environment hostile to disease, bacteria, and viruses. These oils receive their energy from the sun through the process of photosynthesis and have a chemical structure that is similar to that found in human cells and tissues.
Many people have come to depend on oils for their ability to eliminate health concerns, increase vitality, promote a feeling of emotional well-being, expand spiritual horizons, and improve creativity and mental functioning. According to ancient texts, oils were used for every condition from gout to a “broken head,” referring to mental illness.
There are many easy methods of application, but two of the most popular involve inhalation or topical techniques, such as massage on the area of concern or the nerve endings on the hands or bottoms of the feet. I always keep a collection of oil bottles in my desk which make up my Energy Tune-Up Kit. If I am having trouble concentrating or am experiencing writer’s block, I wave a bottle of cedarwood under my nose. A computer or other stressful problem calls for a whiff of lavender. A drop of peppermint on the back of the neck will zap a headache in seconds. Everyone will develop their own favorites, but I find that frankincense is a good oil to put in a diffuser during meditation, or if I want an uplifting experience for a longer period, I put a drop of rosewood or sandalwood in a diffuser pendant that I conveniently wear around my neck. The pendant is an excellent way to enjoy the benefit of a small amount of oil for longer periods.
Each plant has a unique energetic pattern or vibration and has been used for centuries for its role in natural healing. Clinical research shows that essential oils can quickly raise the frequency of the human body, restoring mental, emotional, and physical well-being. High-vibration pure oils, such as rose (highest frequency of all), helichrysum, and lavender, for instance, enable the user to feel happier and experience thoughts that will attract an abundance of all that is good.
Not only will medicinal essential oils raise your vibration, but because of their effect on the limbic system of the brain, they may help combat depression, reduce stress, and improve your mental clarity and focus. Oils can also help release negative energy that is not in harmony with your highest good. Beware of perfume-quality oils or oils with chemical additives, which can actually lower your vibration and cause physical side effects, such as headaches or skin reactions.
Frequencies that surround us influence our state of well-being and our ability to attract either good or bad experiences. Low-vibration, negative thinking and emotional states (depression, sadness, grief, etc.) promote more of the same, unless some positive change occurs in the person’s thinking and perceptions. Like attracts like, and we create our existence with our thoughts.
Remember that with these simple and readily available tools, you have the ability to increase your vibration and access the highest and fastest energies for the purpose of ridding yourself of problems, improving your physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health, and achieving success in life. You will be amazed at what you can accomplish with a 20-minute meditation and a few drops of essential oil, such as frankincense. Learn this simple technique, and take control of your life!
by: Peggy Carey
Tags: affirmations, Chakra, Change, dreams, energy, Increase, Kundalini, Life, life energy, life force, Meditation, Mind, mind power, Power, Vibration
Russian Kirlian Camera can see Human Soul
Posted by admin | Filed under Science, Spiritual
From: russiatoday.com
 A wonder device can see the soul of a dead man pass away… or at least that’s what the inventor claims. A publication of the popular Russian tabloid Life.ru gives a dramatic account of the experiments of an inventor from St Petersburg, who has created a device able to see human aura. Accompanied by pictures suspiciously reminiscent of a series of thermal images of a woman at different temperatures, the report claims they are made with a special “gas discharge camera” built by Konstantin Korotkov, a professor at the Research Institute of Physical Culture and State University of Information Technologies, Mechanics and Optics. The paper goes on to say that the device can register the circumstances of death, differentiating between a victim of a violent crime and a person who died quietly in bed. It also registers the changes in aura presumably made by a strong psychic working on somebody. Disregarding the glib comparison of the religious term “soul” with the new age “aura”, the claims – they can hardly even be expected to get support in peer-reviewed scientific papers in our opinion – prompted RT to take a little investigation into the wonder device. Kirlian camera The spiffy name is actually modern application of a well-known phenomenon called Kirlian effect, named after Semyon and Valentina Kirlians, a Russian couple who greatly contributed to popularizing it back in 1960s. Kirlian experimented with photographing objects with high voltage applied to them. Also known as electro-magnetic discharge imaging, Kirlian photography is named after the Russian scientists who popularized the technique for use in parapsychology research.
The strong electric field causes faint corona discharges around the edges, which can even be seen with the naked eye. The visual appeal of the effect won the hearts of mystic-oriented people. Starting with Kirlians themselves, many people claimed that the electrical phenomena was actually a way to visualize otherwise invisible auras of objects. Korotkov is one of these claimants. According to him, corona discharges around fingertips, which his GDV cameras cause, have information about one’s physical condition and this information can be used for diagnosis. The claim was never confirmed by clinical tests, but it didn’t prevent the device from becoming the cornerstone of a widespread business. With different models costing from $4,500 to $13,000, and official dealers all across Russia and abroad, the invention seems to generate enough cash for Korotkov to travel the world and promote his product. Not for diagnosis Another selling point – the testing of the device on Russian sportsmen – showed that readings of the device may vary slightly with the state of mind of the subjects. As it does with variations in the environment, like a change of air temperature or humidity. In an interview given to a newspaper two years ago Korotkov said his invention was like a knife: it could be used for good or for bad purposes. Indeed, the beautiful Kirlian effect can be used for dubious intentions, or for inspiring works of art like those of photographer Robert Buelteman here. As far as public science goes, there is no other application for it. Source: russiatoday.com Energy fields around mushroom (Kirlian photography)
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The instrument, which was presented to us as something involved in the study of death, turned out to have been designed as a medical diagnosis tool. With about 15 years of development behind it, its inventor claims that it’s an affordable early-diagnosis tool, capable of identifying any disease, from an ulcer to a brain tumor, by scanning irregularities in an aura. Sort of a spiritual healer in metal and plastic, available to everyone for a small fee. No mystical stuff here – a patient can see his own aura on the computer screen, all thanks to the “gas discharge visualization” or GDV.Tags: after, aura, camera, death, Diagnosis, energy, Health, Human, Kirlan, Life, Medical, Russian, See, Soul, Spirit
The Catch Basket Concept
Posted by admin | Filed under Spiritual
By Robert Bruce
A New Approach to Life and The Greater Spiritual Reality
Copyright © 2000 by Robert Bruce
I found the following article, yet again, while searching through my computer files. I had completely forgotten writing it. It seems a shame to waste it, so here it is. It explains a little about who I am and where I am coming from, and why I write the books and articles I do. My life; it’s been a learning process in every sense of The Word.
In the mid-to-late nineteen-eighties, I experienced a serious belief system challenge. Glaring contradictions arose at every turn, between my ongoing hard-life experiences and popularly accepted New Age concepts of spiritual reality. I struggled to comprehend and integrate my experience with this paradigm, being forced time and time again to accept illogical compromises. But adaptation of my life experience soon became impossible and I began suffocating under its awkward burden. The popular model rapidly became unworkable in a practical sense. Either I was going crazy and experiencing consistent, repeatable delusions, as were all the people I was helping, or something was decidedly rotten in downtown Denmark.
Like many people down through the ages, I had spent my life searching for spiritual truth and meaning to life. For many years, I had sat in development groups, prayed, meditated, visualized and read until my eyes burned and my mind reeled under the massive contradictory onslaught. I developed psychic abilities, had spectacular OBE’s, visions and mystical experiences. I made good progress, but still I need more. . .
I was eventually reborn and transformed when I raised my kundalini to its highest level around 1987 (this was when the enigma of my life became apparent to me). But raising kundalini, in itself, does not bring instant enlightenment. Kundalini has to be raised regularly and mastered, just like any other ability. The first time kundalini is raised it causes ‘abstract’ enlightenment, not actual enlightenment. You know everything while kundalini is raised, but cannot realize this when you return to a normal level of consciousness (the base level of consciousness in the normal waking state). There are no shortcuts, and there is no way of avoiding all the hard work and hard-life experience necessary for the abstracts to filter down into your conscious mind and physical reality.
All of this gleaned me glimpses of the greater spiritual reality above, with a few tantalizingly abstract snippets of abstract higher truth thrown in for good measure. But my increasingly strong contact with the greater spiritual reality provided me with a flood of contradictions to the popularly accepted model. This intellectual burden grew and grew as my belief system was stretched way beyond its design limits. It rapidly approached critical mass.
I was offered a solution in 1990. I had a major experience where an angel, or my higher-self (hard to tell which, and somewhat of a moot point really) manifested to me as a powerful objective voice. I could have recorded this had I a tape recorder handy; it was that audible. I was wide-awake and standing up. I had just stepped out of the shower and was about to start my evening meditation, around 9 pm. It was the most beautiful voice I have ever heard: deep, masculine, eloquent, loving, forgiving and wise. The atmosphere was intense. I felt like a small child might feel when standing before God in a great cathedral for the very first time. The sense of awe and loving fatherly forgiveness is overpowering. As I write, just revisiting my living memory of this causes tears of deep spiritual longing to flood down my face; such is the emotional impact of this experience.
NB: This was the same objective voice that had spoken to me a couple of years earlier, when it then instructed me to begin teaching myself how to write. Since I barely finished grade eight, this was no mean feat in itself. I had worked hard, and by the time of the second visitation, had already mastered the basics of English and grammar. Even so, I still felt I had not done enough. But direct contact with spiritual beings from the greater reality always has this effect, especially when they come to you.
The voice asked me to sit down, and then proceed to explain a great many things to me, the most important of which was advice on how to proceed on my quest for higher spiritual truth and knowledge. I was instructed to dismantle my belief system, and then to intelligently rebuild it from scratch. I was told to be disciplined in my approach and to use personal experience, logic and commonsense to build a new foundation belief system, upon which to continue my quest for true enlightenment.
The foundation belief system lies deep within the subconscious mind. This comprises a set of conceptual mental filters and shields, which are fundamental to one’s physical and spiritual existence. These shape and affect your thoughts and perceptions by filtering ideas and inspirations, making these conform to a central theme, as set by your foundation beliefs. All knowledge lies within your heart. But accessing this is extraordinarily difficult. Everything has to pass through your conceptual filters before it can be perceived or realized.
If one’s fundamental beliefs are even slightly flawed, information trying to pass through becomes distorted or blocked. Imagine new truths as being delicate square crystals, and flawed conceptual filters (contradictory beliefs) as being coarse round holes. New truths are effectively blocked. If one forces them through, the results are splintered octagonals, i.e., fractured, distorted or incomplete truths.
Therefore, if a higher intelligence (be it God, one’s higher-self, holy guardian angel or spirit guide) tries to pass contradictory new truths through a flawed belief system, these truths are conceptually blocked or distorted. The greater the fundamental errors in one’s belief system, the greater will be the distortion. All things being equal, this is why some people can receive inspiration (be it scientific or spiritual) and others cannot or receive only poorly.
This concept that you create your own spiritual reality is nothing new. Versions of this can be found in a great many books of spiritual philosophy. But actually realizing how this works and applying it to one’s own foundation belief system in pursuit of higher truth and knowledge is an entirely different matter.
I was given detailed instructions on how to accomplish this. The next day I sat down and made a list of all the things I believed in concerning my spiritual reality. I then analyzed and erased all the things I had not actually experienced or proven for myself. After many days of pondering and revising, I ended up with a very small list indeed. It went something like this:
- OBE is real: I’ve had Astral projections all my life.
- Clairvoyance is real: I’ve seen auras and visions all my life.
- Healing is real: I’ve both given and received it, seen and felt its power.
- Kundalini is real: I raised mine to its highest level in 1987, and many times since.
- We survive death: I’ve seen people after their deaths and have visited the spirit worlds.
- A higher force is concerned with human existence and its spiritual evolution: I’ve experienced this many times — the voice I heard above is just one example.
- Angels, masters, deities and good spirits are real: I’ve interacted with these many times.
- Bad spirits are real: I’ve experienced poltergeists and psychic attacks, been possessed and self-exorcised, and helped many people and children with similar problems.
Gone were personal spirit guides (while I had learned to believe I had one, I had never actually met or openly communicated with him). Gone was the involvement of spirits in just about everything spiritual and psychic (I had no hard experience to support this, only vague assumptions). And gone was the entire organized spirit structure above us that I had been taught to believe in (I had no real proof this was accurate). I also had a quandary. Apart from angels and other such exalted beings (which have such power and presence they are impossible to mistake for who they truly are) I had no reliable way of telling good spirits from bad spirits. Therefore, logically, I had to reject all lesser spirits until I discovered a reliable method of discernment.
The above might sound extreme, but it is eminently logical. Given the source, I took the advice I had been given to heart. I would learn to live this new way of truth and to apply it to my life.
My final list was real and true, as I had personally experienced everything on it. As instructed, I would build on what was real and discard everything else. I was told to shelve items of ‘possible’ truth aside, until proven or disproven. However, this is easier said than done and I went into what I can only describe as spiritual shock. I felt empty, alone and depressed. I had to keep stopping myself from talking to my spirit guide during prayers. If I was to do this at all, as instructed, I had to go all the way.
In time, this new foundation belief system settled more comfortably within me. I got over my emptiness and began filling my aching void with practical truth and knowledge. From this point onwards, slowly and surely, everything started to come together in my life. As instructed, I began writing a journal of my thoughts and ideas. I used the writing process to nurture my inner genius, to free up the flow of inspiration between my physical-self and my higher-self. This flow, I had been told, was blocked not only by my previously flawed conceptual filters, but by the vast differences in consciousness: between the level of consciousness of my normal awake mind (my base level of consciousness) and the more rarified and abstract level where my higher-self resided within me.
I turned my unanswered questions into journal articles. These contained everything I experientially knew to be true about each subject. I found myself putting in many logical subtitles and question marks to represent gaps in my knowledge. I used the writing process (revision, sleep, revision, sleep, and so on) to coax the truth from my dreams, and from the deep recesses of my higher spiritual-self. As instructed, I began shutting myself away in a dark, silent room for several hours at a time, discovering a profound new level of deep trance thinking. I thought, dreamed, meditated and wrote on seemingly unfathomable arcane matters.
In time began receiving inspirational ideas. My dreams and visions swam with sparkling clues; tiny pieces of the jigsaws I was trying to build. My logical and inspirational processes began working overtime, far more powerful than ever before. I found myself waking many times during sleep, compelled to reach for pen and paper to record new ideas. Mundane conversations and events triggered intellectual storms through the mental associations they caused, necessitating much frantic note-taking as inspirational ideas surfaced like glistening dolphins leaping from the murky waters of my subconscious mind.
In time, I accepted this process and began working with it. I felt like I had been reborn. This is how I developed my Catch Basket concept. During the day, I set my catch baskets by pondering unanswered questions. These are baited with rich crumbs of personal experience, tantalizing ideas and juicy pieces of logic. In the morning, I check these for fruits that have been cast into them from above. I record everything and add each small harvest to my questioning articles. Pretty soon, these began fleshing themselves out and filling in the mysterious gaps.
In truth, my work teaches me just as much as it teaches those I share it with. Over the years since I began this process, my catch basket repository began groaning with ripe esoteric fruits. As instructed, I began pouring these into the articles, tutorials and books I eventually began writing.
Over the years since my arcane riddle began, my inspirational process grew into a finely-tuned subtle mechanism. Now, if I have a serious question the answer always comes to me. Sometimes it surfaces immediately, sometimes days, months or even years later, but the clues that lead me to the answers always come. This has given me drive and purpose, plus an ever-increasing fascination for this many-splendored thing we call mortal life. Whatever the future holds in store, I look forward to living it with great interest.
I hope the above explanation of where I am coming from is of some help to people who might be struggling with their own beliefs. It is neither my intention nor my joy to cast doubts upon anyone’s heartfelt theories and beliefs. But if my work causes you belief system discomfort, then how solid were your beliefs to begin with? While faith is a priceless jewel, if one accepts anything blindly one risks polluting one’s essential foundation belief system with the curse of mindless dogmatism.
Please keep an open mind to the possibilities I have introduced here. The popular New Age spiritual model contains a great deal of beautiful, comforting philosophy. But it can fall down quite badly in a practical sense, especially when applied to dark supernatural problems. If one clings to this model, the development of new concepts and the gathering of higher spiritual truths becomes virtually impossible. The parameters of current popular spiritual models simply do not allow for this. Because of this, many people today bend the rules and invent elaborate explanations to get around these problems, while dogmatically holding true to popular beliefs. But this increased complexity prohibits a more direct approach. It leads to belief system obfuscation and ineffective methods being developed.
A Little Sage Advice To Close On:
Question everything, especially the sacred cows of dogma. Always think for yourself. Experiment and learn from all that life has to offer you. Listen to and consider the wisdom of others, and try on their ideas as you might try on a new coat for size. Never buy a new coat just because it seems to fit; it must be practical, within your price range, and look good on you too. And above all, build your own foundation belief system from the wealth of your own personal life experience.
Copyright © 2000 by Robert Bruce
Reprinted with permission
About Robert Bruce
Robert Bruce is an internationally respected arcane mystic, best-selling author, and charismatic speaker from the land down under (Australia). For over 25 years he has actively explored metaphysical, paranormal, energetic and spiritual phenomena, making a number of groundbreaking discoveries. Robert is the author of ‘Astral Dynamics‘ and Practical Psychic Self-Defense, and coauthor of Mastering Astral Projection. Robert is a true spiritual pioneer of our times. The experiential depth and scope of his knowledge is quite remarkable.
Visit http://www.astralpulse.com to see the latest updates of Robert Bruce’s work.
This is a general copyright notice for all online articles and tutorials carrying the name of ‘Robert Bruce’ as the author. All rights are most definitely reserved. However, the author gives permission for people to freely copy any of his online articles and tutorials for their personal use, and for them to to store these on their personal computers, and for them to display these on their public websites, and for them to share these in electronic magazines, providing the author’s name and website url are attached to every article, i.e., (written by Robert Bruce, date written, www.astralpulse.com ) Further to this, short excerpts from the author’s online articles and tutorials may be used by authors in other works, following the rules of ‘fair usage’ as long as these excerpts and quotes are properly referenced and attributed to the author. Please see full copyright notice.
Upcoming Workshops
For more details about this workshop go to:
http://www.astralpulse.com/workshop/workshop.htm
Tags: Approach, Astral, Bruce, death, Ego, Greater, Life, New, Projection, Reality, robert, Spiritual, Timeless, Truth, Wisdom, Word
Easy-to-grow useful plants
Posted by admin | Filed under Science, World
Having ideas about growing your own food, but don’t know where to begin? These pages are for you.
Tags: Easy, Farming, Gardening, Grow, Health, Herbs, Life, Living, Plants, Science, Society, Survival, Urban
Aliens may be watching us
Posted by admin | Filed under Alien, UFO Phenomenon
As astronomers scan the universe for signs of intelligent life, a group of researchers predicts other beings just might be looking at us.
A scientific paper published in this week’s online edition of Astrophysical Journal suggests alien astronomers armed with a large space telescope could detect our planet and possibly determine the presence of life.
“They would only be able to see earth as a single pixel, rather than resolving it to take a picture,” University of Florida astronomer and paper co-author, Professor Eric Ford, said.
“But that could be enough for them to identify our planet as one that likely contains clouds and oceans of liquid water.”
In the past 20 years, astronomers have found more than 200 planets. However, none appear to have the conditions for supporting earth-like life.
Most are hot-gas planets similar to Jupiter, with no solid surface and an atmosphere composed largely of hydrogen and helium.
“The goal of [our] project was to see how much information you can extract from very limited data,” fellow co-author and MIT associate professor, Sara Seager, said.
According to the paper, a great deal of information about a planet can be gleaned from that single pixel and the way it changes over time.
The paper suggests an alien telescope could collect enough light to identify chemicals in our atmosphere and record periodic changes in the brightness of the earth due to clouds and rotation.
It may even be able to determine the presence of land and oceans from earth’s changing light pattern.
Prof Ford believes the hypothetical research will be useful to astronomers designing the next generation of telescopes, providing an outline of the capabilities required for studying earth-like planets.
He hopes that his research will help to motivate an ever larger space telescope that could search for earth-like planets around many stars.
“Maybe somebody’s looking at us right now,” Ms Seager said.
Source: AAP
Tags: ALiens, Astrophysical, FLORIDA, Life, Presence, proof, Research, University, Watching
White House Briefed, Life on Mars?
Posted by admin | Filed under Alien, NASA
The surface zones where samples have been excavated by Phoenix (NASA)
It would appear that the US President has been briefed by Phoenix scientists about the discovery of something more “provocative” than the discovery of water existing on the Martian surface. This news comes just as the Thermal and Evolved Gas Analyzer (TEGA) confirmedexperimental evidence for the existence of water in the Mars regolith on Thursday. Whilst NASA scientists are not claiming that life once existed on the Red Planet’s surface, new data appears to indicate the “potential for life” more conclusively than the TEGA water results. Apparently these new results are being kept under wraps until further, more detailed analysis can be carried out, but we are assured that this announcement will be huge…
So why is there all this secrecy? According to scientists in communication with Aviation Week & Space Technology, the next big discovery will need to be mulled over for a while before it is announced to the world. In fact, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory science team for the MECA wet-chemistry instrument that made these undisclosed findings were kept out of the July 31st news conference (confirming water) so additional analysis could be carried out, avoiding any questions that may have revealed their preliminary results. They have also made the decision to discuss the results with the Bush Administration’s Presidential Science Advisor’s office before a press conference between mid-August and early September.
Although good news, Thursday’s announcement of the discovery of water on Mars comes as no surprise to mission scientists and some are amused by the media’s reaction to the TEGA results. “They have discovered water on Mars for the third or fourth time,” one senior Mars scientist joked. These new MECA results are, according to the Phoenix team, a little more complex than the water “discovery.” Scientists are keen to point out however, that this secretive news will in no way indicate the existence of life (past or present) on Mars; Phoenix simply is not equipped make this discovery. What it can do is test the Mars soil for compounds suitable to support life. The MECA instrument does have microscopes capable of resolving bacterial-scale life forms however, but this is not the focus of the forthcoming announcement, sources say.
This new MECA discovery, combined with TEGA data will probably expose something more compelling, completing another piece of the puzzle in the search for the correct conditions for life as we know it to survive on Mars. Critical to this search is to understand how the recently confirmed water and Mars regolith behave together under the Phoenix lander in the cold Martian arctic.
The MECA instrument had already made the landmark discovery that Mars “soil” was much like the soil more familiar on Earth. This finding prompted scientists to indicate that the minerals and pH levels in the regolith could support some terrestrial plants, indicating this would be useful for future Mars settlers.
What with the discovery of water, and the discovery that Mars soil is very much like the stuff we find on Earth, it is hard to guess as to what the MECA’s second soil test has discovered. What ever it is, it sounds pretty significant, especially as NASA and the University of Arizona are taking extraordinary steps to avoid any more details being leaked to the outside world. I just hope were not getting excited over something benign…
Tags: Alien, bush, Discovery, JET, JPL, Life, Life on mars, Mars, NASA, Phoenix scientists, UFO, White house
