Life from space?

[Red Shirt]

I am neither qualified or well versed enough to be posting here but that's not going to stop me. So, I'm watching Expedition Unknown and one segment had a balloon launched to near space (100,00 ft). an experiment package took a sample and was later analyzed for signs of life. Of course they might have found some. The claim was made that life cannot get that high in the atmosphere on its own. Therefore any life found must have come from out there. My mind immediately starts debunking this claim. The balloon that carried the package probably was crawling with microbes even if the experiment was shielded.  It could also come from one of the many objects we mere mortals have lobbed into space. Maybe even volcanic eruptions or some other natural occurring though rare event. Point being there seems to be too many assumptions in what was being stated in the segment. I felt this way a few years ago when it was claimed there was algae on the exterior of the ISS windows. Someone clue me in here.

[YNM]

4 hours ago, Red Shirt said:

near space (100,00 ft)

Is that a lakh ? Maybe you mean 10,000 ? Or 100,000 ?

For the record, "Space" starts at 100 km per FAI (1,00,000 m or 100,000 m or roughly 33,00,000 ft or 330,000 ft). "Space" by US Air Force in the 1960s starts at 50 miles (264,000 ft. or 2,64,000 ft or roughly 80 km or 80,000 m). Your figure is at most only 4% of them. Birds can fly higher than that.

 

If you do mean 100,000 ft , then there are winds up there.

Edited October 28, 2017 by YNM

[Green Baron]

4 hours ago, YNM said:

Is that a lakh ?... (1,00,000 m or ...

It can happen to the best of us ;-)

I am sure he meant a 100,000ft (~30km), that is balloon altitude and in the stratosphere. I have heard of microorganisms higher than that but i can' remember where, but of course they come from earth, not from space.

"Normally"there is no to little exchange between the tropo- and the stratosphere. On rare occasions (extremely developed cold fronts, volcanoes, idiotic nuclear tests, maybe tropical storms) material from the troposphere (usually full of microbes) can be transported into stratosphere. Earth's biosphere apparently does not have an abrupt upper limit.

That's where i would start to search .... but i can be wrong.

Edited October 28, 2017 by Green Baron

[Red Shirt]

Yes, I mistyped should be 100,000 ft. Beside the point, from what I am seeing I am correct to be skeptical.

Were there any further statements made about the claim of microbes on the outside of the ISS and their origin, post the original comments 2014? Were they confirmed as organic? 

[YNM]

19 minutes ago, Red Shirt said:

Were there any further statements made about the claim of microbes on the outside of the ISS and their origin, post the original comments 2014? Were they confirmed as organic? 

I thought they were attributed to whatever waste they're throwing off the station ?

[Red Shirt]

My short Google search didn't show anything after the initial Russian report in 2014. I'll try again. 

.... do they intentionally throw stuff of the station? That doesn't seem like a good idea.

[YNM]

11 minutes ago, Red Shirt said:

.... do they intentionally throw stuff of the station? That doesn't seem like a good idea.

Although they don't just send trash out randomly (rather putting them with the used cargo vehicke for safe deorbiting), there could be dust flakes off suits, unsterilized surfaces, minorly leaky exposed experiment, cubesats, collision debris. At one point they intentionally threw a russian EVA suit out because it's already replaced (and it was no longer safely usable I think). It worked as a satellite for a few weeks or some months or so. "Life will find it's way" becomes waay truer when you're talking them in dusts.

So, that experiment you're describing ? I think it may have detected one off these instead.

The "farthest"* evidence of life matter is some amino acids in comets or something. Even so I recall reading a possibility that they might just happened after a really long time naturally. You can't be very sure.

 

* actual farthest one is definitely on Voyager 1.

Edited October 28, 2017 by YNM

[Green Baron]

I can only find magazine articles about bacteria outside the iss. One called OU-20 from the village (not a bottle :-)) of Beer claims to have been an experiment.

But since there are apparently no scientific articles about it (and i'd certainly expect one) it might be just temperate air as it is not clear who collected what when and under which circumstances and can it be excluded that they weren't just "imported" or sneezed out ? That would be the kind of information i'd like to read.

Stuff sent up to the iss isn't specially cleaned (i think), so there may be trillions hanging on a supply ship's outside.

Edited October 28, 2017 by Green Baron

[PB666]

I was cleaning my pockets and some life accidentally fell out, sorry next time I will clean them at 60,000 meters.

Of course everyone has heard of the Jet stream and cat 5 storms. These things eject lots of particulates high in to the atmosphere where they redistribute, spores of microbes can survive. Not such an astounding find.

If the ISS strikes a spore while traveling at 7600 m/s that spore and all of its contents would be instantly ionized.

"In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move . . . .. the Universe being the
puzzling place it is, other explanations are constantly being sought. " Douglas Adams in HHGTTG. 

Edited October 28, 2017 by PB666

[cubinator]

We are not that good at sterilizing our ships