Recovery of Cometary Microorganisms from the Stratosphere

Milton Wainwright

doi:10.4172/2332-2519.1000110

Abstract

The Hoyle-Wickramasinghe theory of cometary panspermia posits that terrestrial life was introduced by comets, and predicts that this process can be tested by the detection of an ongoing incidence onto the Earth of biological entities. Searching the stratosphere for microorganisms began tentatively in the 1960’s but more serious attempts to recover microorganisms from the stratosphere commenced after 2001. Since this time evidence for a continuing microbiological input from space has accumulated but such evidence has tended to be either overlooked or dismissed as contaminants. Our most recent balloon flight of July 2013 to a height of 22-27 km above Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England led to the collection of several types of microorganisms directly onto electron microscope stubs, some leading to the formation of micro-craters and so confirming infall at high speed as well as their extraterrestrial origin. In one instance a sphere of diameter 30 μm was isolated and found to be mainly composed of titanium in its outer layers (with smaller amounts of vanadium). Nano-manipulation and EDX analysis showed that the titanium sphere contains a carbonaceous non-granular interior material which we suggest is a biological protoplast. Other isolates include distinctly biological filaments, a diatom frustule and a few unidentified biological entities. The relatively large sizes of the particles point decisively to their extraterrestrial origin.

Highlights

A prediction of the theory of cometary panspermia is that microorganisms, singly, and in clumps, as well as viruses, continue to enter the Earth from space [1,2,3]
No particulate matter was found on any of the unexposed microscope stubs, This shows that the drawer remained airtight and that none of the stubs was exposed to particles at, or near, ground-level or at any height up to the stratosphere. These results show that no particles contaminated the stubs during any of the sample processing procedures, thereby demonstrating that the scrupulous procedures used to prevent ground-level contamination proved effective and that no such contamination occurred
Á major problem that faces anyone researching the microbiology of the stratosphere is the difficulty of distinguishing between biological entities, bacteria and fungi, from particles of cosmic dust which in some cases can mimic the morphology of these entities, notably bacteria [20,21,22]

Summary

Recovery of Cometary Microorganisms from the Stratosphere

Milton Wainwright*1,3, N Chandra Wickramasinghe, Christopher E Rose, Alexander J Baker2 1Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, University of Sheffield, UK 2Leonardo Centre for Tribology, University of Sheffield, UK 3Centre for Astrobiology, University of Buckingham, UK

Introduction

Earlier Attempts to Recover Stratospheric Microorganisms

Balloon launch

Biological Entities Discovered

Discussion