Liquid water is a requirement for life on Earth. But in other, much colder worlds, life might exist beyond the bounds of water-based chemistry.
Taking a simultaneously imaginative and rigidly scientific view, Cornell chemical engineers and astronomers offer a template for life that could thrive in a harsh, cold world – specifically Titan, the giant moon of Saturn. A planetary body awash with seas not of water, but of liquid methane, Titan could harbor methane-based, oxygen-free cells that metabolize, reproduce and do everything life on Earth does.
Their theorized cell membrane, composed of small organic nitrogen compounds and capable of functioning in liquid methane temperatures of 292 degrees below zero, is published in Science Advances, Feb. 27. The work is led by chemical molecular dynamics expert Paulette Clancy, the Samuel W. and Diane M. Bodman Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, with first author James Stevenson, a graduate student in chemical engineering. The paper’s co-author is Jonathan Lunine, the David C. Duncan Professor in the Physical Sciences in the College of Arts and Sciences’ Department of Astronomy.
Lunine is an expert on Saturn’s moons and an interdisciplinary scientist on the Cassini-Huygens mission that discovered methane-ethane seas on Titan. Intrigued by the possibilities of methane-based life on Titan, and armed with a grant from the Templeton Foundation to study non-aqueous life, Lunine sought assistance about a year ago from Cornell faculty with expertise in chemical modeling. Clancy, who had never met Lunine, offered to help.
“We’re not biologists, and we’re not astronomers, but we had the right tools,” Clancy said. “Perhaps it helped, because we didn’t come in with any preconceptions about what should be in a membrane and what shouldn’t. We just worked with the compounds that we knew were there and asked, ‘If this was your palette, what can you make out of that?’”
On Earth, life is based on the phospholipid bilayer membrane, the strong, permeable, water-based vesicle that houses the organic matter of every cell. A vesicle made from such a membrane is called a liposome. Thus, many astronomers seek extraterrestrial life in what’s called the circumstellar habitable zone, the narrow band around the sun in which liquid water can exist. But what if cells weren’t based on water, but on methane, which has a much lower freezing point?
Read more: Life ‘not as we know it’ possible on Saturn’s moon Titan
The Latest on: Methane-based life
[google_news title=”” keyword=”Methane-based life” num_posts=”10″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]
via Google News
The Latest on: Methane-based life
- Martian Methane Baffles Scientists: Curiosity Rover’s Surprising Discoveryon April 27, 2024 at 1:13 am
A recent paper may help explain why a portable chemistry lab on NASA’s Curiosity rover has continually sniffed out traces of the gas near the surface of Gale Crater. The most surprising revelation fro ...
- James Webb Space Telescope investigating aliens after finding planet with 'signs of life'on April 26, 2024 at 10:20 am
The secrets of alien life in the universe could finally be uncovered by NASA today through the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). That's after astronomers came across a planet full of gas that could ...
- Curiosity rover may be 'burping' methane out of Mars' subsurfaceon April 25, 2024 at 1:00 pm
Salt might play a key role in the mysterious behavior of methane seeps on Mars. Since 2012, NASA's Curiosity rover has repeatedly detected methane on Mars, specifically near its landing site inside ...
- Zefiro Methane Corp. "Rings the Bell" at Cboe Canada for its Initial Public Offering (IPO)on April 24, 2024 at 8:40 am
ZEFIRO METHANE CORP. (Cboe Canada: ZEFI) (the “Company”, “Zefiro”, or “ZEFI”) is pleased to announce that its common shares are now trading on the Cboe Canada Inc. (“Cboe Canada”) exchange, as part of ...
- NASA Ponders Why Gas Produced by Life Is Leaking Out of Mars at Nighton April 23, 2024 at 12:38 pm
NASA's Mars Curiosity rover came across mysterious puffs of methane gas that only appear at night and vanish during the day.
- Will we know if TRAPPIST-1e has life?on April 23, 2024 at 10:18 am
The search for extrasolar planets is currently undergoing a seismic shift. With the deployment of the Kepler Space Telescope and the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), scientists discovered ...
- Methane "burps" discovered on Mars could be signs of lifeon April 23, 2024 at 9:25 am
Mars may be a cold, desolate place, but it’s a planet packed with secrets. One of the most intriguing mysteries of Mars has been swirling around the puzzling presence of methane gas. This gas, mostly ...
- Cornell University is measuring animal-borne gases. Here's how it can help the climateon April 22, 2024 at 12:41 pm
Cornell University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences recently celebrated the opening of its latest leap toward creating environmental sustainability for the dairy industry: a suite of ...
- Dragonfly: NASA Just Confirmed The Most Exciting Space Mission Of Your Lifetimeon April 19, 2024 at 3:00 am
Mission to explore the surface of the only moon in the solar system with an Earth-like atmosphere will launch in 2028 and arrive at Saturn's giant moon in 2034.
- Weighing in on tons of methane at Coal Basinon April 17, 2024 at 1:26 pm
The coal mining chapter of Redstone’s history has been closed for the past few decades, and although that sounds like good news for the fight against ...
via Bing News