http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7019473/

I've actually been to the caves in Fox on a school field trip - back in like the 7th or 8th grade. We were living on Ft. Wainwright at the time. I don't recall any details other than that it was cold as all get out inside the cave and on part of one wall that had been dug away you could see a big block of ice which we were told was a frozen lake that contained the remains of a baby mammoth.

k

cool.

Thanks for posting - I'd missed this! It's an extraordinary leap of what we know life forms can achieve, isn't it?

Some bacteria from Paleozoan salt deposits have been said to have been re-activated by some scientists back in the early sixities.

Maybeso but this report today seems conclusive.

I will be camping with a guy who works at NASA this weekend. I will ask him about microbiologist Elena Pikuta of the University of Alabama in Huntsville who contributed to the research of the event and try to get her email address.

This is exciting stuff.

"... what we know life forms can achieve, isn't it?"

I'm very pleasantly surprised, but not entirely shocked.
Life seems to find a way.

k

As I wrote to Bill earlier, this reminds me of the TMV IV virus that disintegrates when its pressure is changed and then automatically reassembles when the pressure is restored - amazing example of a self-organizing system in nature. Seems like life is so tenacious.

k

I tried to find her here in the (still-under-development) campus directory but her name didn't come up; maybe there's another place on the UAH web site:

http://www.uah.edu/cgi-bin/dirread.cgi

I was down in Huntsville on business a few months ago - right across from the campus, but had not heard of her at that time.

k

In reply to:

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Life seems to find a way.

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This reminds me of one of the Jeff Goldberg lines in Jurassic Park. (Sorry for the trivialization, but I could just hear his delivery of that line clearly when I read your statement!]

> Jeff Goldberg lines

"no matter where you go, there you are."

and isn't it, Goldblum?

iceberg

Yikes. Thanks, ET.

it reminds me of the movie Smilia(i should have looked up the name) --smilia sense of snow..

it was a foriegn film-- and it touch on the topic of frozen prehistoric bacteria.. set in finland? sweden? (with sub-titles)

it was a great movie..

"one of the Jeff Goldberg lines in Jurassic Park."

I can't stand Jeff Goldblum, but I did see the movie. I'm sure I must have been inadvertently recalling him when I wrote that.

k

Life finds a way...and that may mean that life exists on more planets than we suppose:

http://www.livescience.com/animalworld/050207_extremophiles.html

Thanks to both of you, D and D, your url was an excellent read.
And how about those white smokers on Fox news today!

If life is everywhere pervasive does that mean that I'm not as special as I think?

Naw, I'm still special...I think.

I'm still special

I do believe the church lady would agree with you.

Elena Pikuta is a church lady? Oh, I do hope so!

I was afraid she might be one of those thick-boned farm-woman/communist doctors from the Ukraine on temporary loan to NASA.

But I'll ask her. I have a call in for her at the University of Alabama at Huntsville and I'll let you know if she returns my call.

Elena Pikuta is a church lady?

There you go again.