http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HZsFMqqGJo
Kepler link. The researchers assert that according to all earth searches life requires “liquid water. This has shown to be true in the Driest Antarctic valleys and the driest deserts in the world still have adapted plants or micro-organisms adapted to capture and retain the smallest amounts of liquid water in the immediate and surrounding environments.
The temperature conducive to life must be within the “Goldilocks Zone” i.e. not too cold to be frozen and not too hot to evaporate instantaneously.
They also state the “common view” of carbon and water are the essentials required for life. They don’t exclude other ways for life to live but accept this is the “known successful” essentials.
Water vapour has been identified to be within some gas clouds in space. apparently but the viability of life is questionable in that environment.
More recently the ISS reported the presence of living plankton on the outer shell of the ISS. This seems interesting to me.
I thought about a few things.
Freezing meat does not kill bacteria but rather slows down the bacteria growth rates to reduce food spoilage risks but does not kill the bacteria. This assertion seems to be contrary to the assertion of liquid water being required to sustain life.
Most recently the discovery of living plankton has been detected on the ISS outer shell. While I am of the view that the plankton is earth based in origin, the interesting point is that the plankton is alive an living in a space environment. What water would be collecting on the ISS would there be any condensation accumulating on the outer shell?
The source of water would not be from space or could it be?
The connection between the cold and life occurs to me in relation to comets in particular.
Since comets are such cold places with icy tails and have long been considered a possible source for spreading and perhaps capturing simple bacteria or life forms while orbiting around the universe.
The discovery of the plankton may add plausible weight to life possibly being distributed through out the universe and via comets. From my perspective this seem likely, given that the plankton is still alive even though relocated and recolonised to a space environment. Thus seems more likely to sensibly hypothesize that simple or simpler life forms or bacteria live as viably on a comet too.
I considered the