Hi all,
I have a question about the novel, which may have been answered eloquently in the novel and I may have missed it, so I will ask it here instead:
If the 'Taumoeba' feeds on Astrophages and destroys it, where is all the energy stored in the Astrophages gone? Surely energy can't just disappear just because Taumoeba consumed the Astrophages. I ask because this is a critical part of the narrative, and changed the entire course of the story. What Dr. Grace saw when he opened the fuel lines, was smelly black gunk which is the byproduct caused by the Taumoeba consuming astrophages. He even considered using the methane formed as a fuel, however, that proved to generate very little energy compared to what he needs to travel back home to earth. Can someone shed light on this? in a nutshell: what happens to the energy stored in Astrophages once they are consumed by taumoeba?
Thanks in advance,
Aghiad
