Thaindian News

By Madhuri Dey
Dec 2, (THAINDIAN NEWS) Despite widespread rumors and speculations that U.S. space agency NASA is all set to make significant announcement about the presence of life beyond Earth in a news conference later today, it seems that believers in alien life are in for a disappointment. According to reports, during Thursday’s news conference, the space agency are going to unveil their findings of a new microbe that has the unique characteristics of surviving in the arsenic, thus refuting earlier presumption that the element is poisonous to support life.

It has been reported that the bacteria has been discovered at Mono Lake near the Yosemite National Park in the state of California. The distinct microbe which substitutes arsenic for the element phosphorus for its survival, points out that life might also be present in other planets where the atmosphere lacks phosphorus. Prior to the discovery of the bacteria, it was presumed that the presence of the element phosphorus is a major precursor for life and any form of life cannot exist without the element. However, the fact that NASA would supposedly announce the discovery of the unique bacteria in the press conference scheduled to take place later today, might came as a huge disappointment for those who believe in the existence of alien life.

On Tuesday, the United States based space agency had made the announcement that it would be holding a press conference on Thursday afternoon where it would discuss certain ‘astrobiology’ findings which would ‘impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life.’ Understandably, the announcement created extensive buzz triggering frenzied speculation on the web.