Evidence of Extraterrestrial Fossils found on Meteorite. Dec 29, 2012.

Fossil Diatoms in a New Carbonaceous Meteorite

We report the discovery for the first time of fossilised diatoms in a carbonaceous meteorite that fell in the North Central Province of Sri Lanka on 29 December 2012. Contamination is excluded by the circumstance that the elemental abundances within the structures match closely with those of the surrounding matrix. There is also evidence of structures morphologically similar to red rain cells that may have contributed to the episode of red rain that followed withing days of the meteorite fall. The new data on fossil diatoms provide strong evidence to support the theory of cometary panspermia.

Fragments of the meteorite were examined under an environmental scanning electron microscope at the School of Earth Sciences at Cardiff University. Structures of various shapes, including large numbers of slender cylinders of lengths 5-10µm, and a few micrometers in diameter are seen to be distributed extensively throughout the sample. The larger ovoidal object possesses a micro-structure and morphology characteristic of a wide class of terrestrial diatoms. Diatoms are unicellular phytoplankton. The intricately woven micro-structure of these frustules would be impossible to generate abiotically, so the presence of structures of this kind in any extraterrestrial setting could be construed as unequivocal proof of biology.

Quiet an interesting academic article. Although I still somewhat skeptical and waiting until it is peer reviewed by respected figures in the science community.

This will be how disclosure works. First fossils, then live microbes underground on Mars of Venus, followed by the announcement of a truly "Earth Like Planet" with an O2 and nitrogen atmosphere.

"Little green men" will come later. I think once we start getting our quantum commnications abilities (via non-locality) we'll open a whole new world of communication. Then we'll finally get a "signal".

It'll probably be 20-50 years before actual intelligent life is met in person by a human and admitted to the world.

Still, that article is pretty interesting.

ETA: I really do think the "Martian Meteorite" that supposedly had fossils actually did. The time wasn't quite right then, and it was decided to say "Ooops! Nevermind!". . .

Hey this is extremly interesting, thanks for posting.

www.lankanewspapers.com...

another news link with a little more info, nice find!

Wow ...
If this discovery is confirmed then that gives the idea of Panspermia a shot in the arm and hints toward a well populated Galaxy in my view .
If the picture is what its claimed it is then I guess that the first picture of an ET on ATS

Originally posted by MZYYY
Although I still somewhat skeptical and waiting until it is peer reviewed by respected figures in the science community.

edit on 14-1-2013 by MZYYY because: (no reason given)

Probably wise, at least until it makes it out of the Sri Lankan tabloids and blogs like "beforeitsnews" and "lunaticoutpost".

Since when do scientists write with such good grammar?

Interesting, but will it be confirmed and reported in the MSM? I'd better not hold my breath.

Thanks for posting. S&F.

Assuming the thing is what it purports to be (and not just a hoax, the details look a little too sharp), then I suppose the hardest thing to prove would be lack of contamination. It's a little easier with an Antarctic meteorite, which lands on ice and not in contaminated soil.

Even if all this is true all it shows is that there's extraterrestrial life out there. This is because these are microfossils. There's no hint that they were alive when the comet/asteroid/etc encountered earth. For all we know, they were probably microfossils for millions or billions of years since htey had long died while enroute from wherever they came from. To prove otherwise you'd have to show that they were thriving on the comet and didn't die until the comet broke up and they were exposed.

There's very strong evidence that bacteria/fungi/etc could not survive interstellar trips on comets or asteroids. However, the scientific community agrees that organic materials are transported. This does not rule out the possibility of extraterrestrial life surviving on rogue planets that drift between stars. With a thick atmosphere and heating from the core of the planet, it might be possible. The possibility of bacteria/fungi/etc surviving interplanetary trips is there, but still contentious.

My last comment is the lead researcher Professor Chandra is controversial. He's widely known for his panspermia theory and his buddhist beliefs that influence his research. Take with some salt. When this is peer reviewed, it may have some merit, or not. Until then, it's just a story.

Originally posted by jonnywhite


My last comment is the lead researcher Professor Chandra is controversial. He's widely known for his panspermia theory and his buddhist beliefs that influence his research. Take with some salt. When this is peer reviewed, it may have some merit, or not. Until then, it's just a story.

edit on 14-1-2013 by jonnywhite because: (no reason given)

That's the "Red Rain" guy, isn't it?

If you go to the online journal there is a part 2.
journalofcosmology.com...

Looking at page 5 they state the photo show is this

We conclude by reporting that an extract from the interior of a Polonnaruwa meteorite sample, studied under a light microscope at the Medical Research Institute in Colombo, was found to contain living diatoms (See Fig.4). If this result is confirmed in future studies and contamination is excluded, the meteorite would have been shown to contain both fossil as well as living microbes, and panspermia thus demonstrated in real time.

The figure shows a live diatom claimed to be extracted. This would be really cool if it turns out true.

Originally posted by drivers1492
If you go to the online journal there is a part 2.
journalofcosmology.com...

Looking at page 5 they state the photo show is this

We conclude by reporting that an extract from the interior of a Polonnaruwa meteorite sample, studied under a light microscope at the Medical Research Institute in Colombo, was found to contain living diatoms (See Fig.4). If this result is confirmed in future studies and contamination is excluded, the meteorite would have been shown to contain both fossil as well as living microbes, and panspermia thus demonstrated in real time.

The figure shows a live diatom claimed to be extracted. This would be really cool if it turns out true.

Holy c***, the implications!

I have a hard time to believe this. Now they even say they extracted a still LIVING organism?
If what they claim is true and the meteorite was really NOT contaminated, this means nothing else but..well..a real, genuine extraterrestrial life form!

Originally posted by drivers1492
If you go to the online journal there is a part 2.
journalofcosmology.com...

en.wikipedia.org...

Reliability

The quality of peer review at the journal has been questioned several times.[2][3][4][5] The journal has also been accused of promoting fringe viewpoints and speculative viewpoints on astrobiology, astrophysics, and quantum physics. Skeptical blogger and biologist PZ Myers said of the journal "... it isn't a real science journal at all, but is the... website of a small group... obsessed with the idea of Hoyle and Wickramasinghe that life originated in outer space and simply rained down on Earth."[

reply to post by gortex

If the picture is what its claimed it is then I guess that the first picture of an ET on ATS

I think you are correct! Although there may be ealier photographs of such Diotoms or Bactirium in carbonaceous chondrites. Perhaps this will be the first to be proven as a fossil of a once living organism that fell from space on a meteorite, i.e. first image of a real ET!

reply to post by Blue Shift

I suppose the hardest thing to prove would be lack of contamination.

How do you suppose a meteorite could be contaminated with fossils? These fossils appear to be imbedded in the carbonaceous chondrite. Diatoms are marine organisms and fossilization takes some time. This meteorite apparently was found within hours, or days, after it hit the ground.

ADD;
From the OP's linked pdf.

A remarkable coincidence that should be noted is that within several days of the meteorite fall, an extensive region around the site of the fall experienced an episode of red rain. The red rain analysed at the MRI in Colorado has been shown to contain red biological cells that show viability as well as motility.

So red rain fell at around the same time as this meteorite. Has this red rain been found to be a HOAX or terrestrial in origin, or could this be the unfossilized or even living organisms of the same type that have been found within this meteorite?

reply to post by draknoir2


Yeah not the best for sources and I am highly doubtful but we can hope.

Very interesting.

Wickramasinghe is fairly well-known proponent of Panspermia, a notion that has some traction.

The diatom 'object' certainly does not look mineral

And there are the donut-shaped cells which look similar to the red rain cells. (Some think that red rain is terrestrial in origin, namely spores. I have not seen proof of this, though it may exist?)

Thus, it is doubly interesting that red rain was reported within the same area as the meteroite crashed, and that the meteorite looks like it holds donut-shaped fossils. It gives credence to the theory of panspermia.

If it is a fresh meteorite, it's hard to see how the embedded fossils should have entered the sample.

Ahh, good point from another thread, www.abovetopsecret.com...:

Originally posted by butcherguy
It is possible that the fossils originated on Earth.

The meteorite may have been a chunk of rock thrown into orbit by an asteroid striking Earth long ago. If this is the case, the fossils are not extraterrestrial.

We are told that the Martian meteorite was dislodged from Mars the same way.

I was not able to pull up the pdf

Under discussion here:
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Neither the journal in which the article was published nor its author rank high on the credibility scale.

Originally posted by drivers1492
reply to post by draknoir2

 

Yeah not the best for sources and I am highly doubtful but we can hope.

The executive editor of The Journal of Cosmology is Dr. Rudolph Schild, an astrophysicist at the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

Here's a list of the other editors for this journal:

Journal of Cosmology Editors

Sir Roger Penrose (Oxford) is even a guest editor.

These aren't exactly 'light-weights'.

This paper should at least be given serious consideration and be scrutinized by the wider scientific community.

reply to post by Brighter

N. Chandra Wickramasinghe, Ph.D.
Executive Editor, Astrobiology Cometary Panspermia

Not the most objective of editors in this case, I would think.

Looks less like a "peer reviewed journal" and more like a forum to push his personal agenda [panspermia].

Thanks for posting OP. I will be keeping an eye on this, but I suspect these scientists have doomed themselves a bit by promoting cometary panspermia in the abstract.

Having looked at the titles of the papers on journalofcosmology.com... - where this papers was published - it does all look a little speculative/cranky.

Something I noticed from the paper and a news clip from Sri Lanka covering the red and yellow rain which fell around the same time as the meteor. The co-occurrence of the red rain is seen by these researchers as being connected to the meteor:

Abnormally high abundances of As(Arsenic) and Ag (gold) in the Sri Lankan red rain cells have been provisionally reported, thus favouring a non-terrestrial habitat, possibly connected with a cometary/asteroidal body, the fragmentationof which led to the Polonnaruwa meteorite fall (Samaranayake and Wickramasinghe, 2012).

Red rain:

Gold nanoparticles/colloidal gold:

Gold:


Yellow rain:

Silver nanoparticles/colloidal silver:

reply to post by draknoir2


Oh now I remember .. this guy
Egg found in Martian Meteorite
Extraterrestrial Life is a censored subject says Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe!

Bummer