Science > Outer Space and "Inner Space" Sciences

Comets and viruses: a hypothesis

(1/7) > >>

Galaxia2002:
Hello, my english is improving but not well enough, be patient please  :rolleyes:

Some time ago I had an idea for a situation which could connect the fall of asteroids with the appearance of pests. This was  explained by me earlier in the forum in Spanish.

I read in the book "The Intelligent Universe" by Fred Hoyle that in the 60s there were some experiments with balloons where it was detected the presence of bacteria apparently  in the upper atmosphere (stratosphere). From that moment had a boom  of the panspermia hypothesis, suggesting that the "seeds" or essence of life (bacteria and viruses) are prevalent scattered throughout the universe and life on Earth began with the arrival of such seeds to our planet, perhaps from asteroids.    In fact were discovered bacteria that survive very tough conditions, including in nuclear reactors (micrococcus radiophilus)

My point is, it is known that in the higher atmospheric regions there are layers of air which do not mix with each other,  and what I propose is that this could be a reservoir of microscopic life where high intensity sunlight could cause mutations including making  pathogenic or not organisms that have arrived there. Even this region could harbor potential microorganisms that come from the disintegration of meteors, but it is very questionable.
Well, my hypothesis is that if there would be this "static" reservoir it could be only seriously disturbed by either upward or downward currents of air, that with more probability would or wouldn´t be permitted in very mountainous regions.
Volcanoes could be a way to feed the reservoir with fresh material from earth, so I could say that not all the biological material can necessarily come from space.

I noticed that many viruses are located in Asia, that could be just my impression but there are several reports as the  flu,  the most common,  and it could be due to the very large bird population, which could serve as reserve of the virus but in this region also there are  very high mountain ranges that could ease the interchange with high atmosphere. This can be a single parelell, but is curious why so many viruses are found in Asia.

Here is what I said Chandra Wickramasinghe astrobiologist said about the SARS virus (from wikipedia)


--- Quote ---On the 24th May 2003 The Lancet published a letter from Wickramasinghe, jointly signed by Milton Wainwright and Jayant Narlikar, which suggested that SARS could be extraterrestrial. The letter is currently (December 2006) referenced on the Cardiff Astrobiology website. It includes this claim:
With respect to the SARS outbreak, a prima facie case for a possible space incidence can already be made...

A small amount of the culprit virus introduced into the stratosphere could make a first tentative fall out East of the great mountain range of the Himalayas, where the stratosphere is thinnest, followed by sporadic deposits in neighbouring areas.
From
http://virus.stanford.edu/uda/
--- End quote ---


--- Quote ---The influenza pandemic of 1918

[...] 
The origins of this influenza variant is not precisely known. It is thought to have originated in China in a rare genetic shift of the influenza virus. The recombination of its surface proteins created a virus novel to almost everyone and a loss of herd immunity.[...]
--- End quote ---


--- Quote ---Flu study sheds light on how it spreads

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/sciencenews/3339763/Flu-study-sheds-light-on-how-it-spreads.html

By Roger Highfield, Science Editor
Last Updated: 6:46PM BST 16 Apr 2008

The biggest studies of their kind have shown how seasonal flu epidemics are born in the Far East, sweep westwards and then die out in South America, crucial intelligence to improve influenza vaccines.

Annual influenza epidemics are thought to infect 5-15 per cent of the world population each year, cause three to five million cases of severe illness, and between 250,000 and 500,000 deaths.

The studies show how epidemics of the most common type of influenza virus, A (H3N2), are seeded by viruses that originate in East and Southeast Asia and migrate around the world.

The new findings suggest that by focusing surveillance efforts on East and Southeast Asia, researchers may be able to extend their forecast of the flu strains most likely to cause epidemics, which may in turn help experts decide which strains should go in the flu vaccine each year. […]
--- End quote ---


--- Quote ---12,000 children in China now have deadly virus

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24469394/

BEIJING - China reported a jump Monday in the number of children sickened with hand, foot and mouth disease, saying more than 11,900 cases have been reported.

At least 24 deaths in the central province of Anhui and Guangdong province in the south have been blamed on enterovirus 71, one of several viruses that cause the disease, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Two other children — one in Guangdong and another in the coastal province of Zhejiang — have also died of hand, foot and mouth disease but it wasn't immediately clear which strain of virus killed them, it said. [...]
--- End quote ---


The other part is how else could get disrupted this potential reservoir of microorganisms?

An asteroid or comet. This is the point, It would make a hole literally in the static layer of the atmosphere dragging a large column of air descending and bringing all the germs of the upper layers. It doesn´t matter if the microorganism come from outside or inside in origin .it is likely that they have time there.  This would be an explanation for the plagues associated with comets, although there may be factors at long-and short-term,  chemical factors that could cause disease at the site of impact and biological factors as viruses that would make large tracts of land.

Here I am aware that there is much speculation on my part and I put this to see if you notice a connection. I would like found a map with the worldwide distribuition of viruses.

Ruth:

--- Quote from: Galaxia2002 on February 27, 2009, 07:51:37 AM ---An asteroid or comet. This is the point, It would make a hole literally in the static layer of the atmosphere dragging a large column of air descending and bringing all the germs of the upper layers. It doesn´t matter if the microorganism come from outside or inside in origin .it is likely that they have time there.  This would be an explanation for the plagues associated with comets, although there may be factors at long-and short-term,  chemical factors that could cause disease at the site of impact and biological factors as viruses that would make large tracts of land.
--- End quote ---

Many bugs (bacteria and viruses) would have a hard time surving in the atmosphere or even on a comet.  They tend to have 'hosts' which are compatible to their needs.  Although not impossible, it does seem improbable that a virus or a bacteria would survive the atmosphere or entry into the atmosphere by a space object.  However there may be quite a significant link between the arrival of a comet and the effect on the human population.  It may be severly challenging to peoples immune systems to have to live through a 'nuclear winter' resulting from a comet impact.  Especially if this is without technology.  This might make it easier for an opportunistic virus of bacteria to infect people.


--- Quote from: Galaxia2002 ---Here I am aware that there is much speculation on my part and I put this to see if you notice a connection. I would like found a map with the worldwide distribuition of viruses.

--- End quote ---

This would get a bit complicated as there are just so many of them (viruses, bacteria and parasites).  And they tend to be hard to track - sometimes, depending on where they are and if they flare up and die out quickly too (try talking to China about SARS in 2003 - they were notoriously closed mouthed about that one).

Here is one for Cholera.  It is a bacteria which has caused havoc and will continue to do so in some countries without adequate water sanitation.  I find it interesting that Blood type Os are most succeptable - and ABs are the most resistant.  Also, it seems that the carriers (not sufferes) of the cystic fibrosis gene are somehow more protected from this bug.  Very strange.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cholera

PepperFritz:

--- Quote ---Many bugs (bacteria and viruses) would have a hard time surving in the atmosphere or even on a comet. 

--- End quote ---


Ah, but you're assuming that biological material originating extraterrestrially would have the same "survival" properties as biological material originating on Earth. The following message and link that I recently posted in another thread, suggests a whole other possibility:



--- Quote ---The following article reports that over the past few years, the state of Kerala, India, has been experiencing strange "red rain" that actually stains people's clothing. Those studying the phenomena do not know the cause, but have discovered that the rain's cells have "extraordinary" properties: They have unusual fluorescence; are able to multiply without DNA; and, unlike any other Earth life, do not die at a temperatures in excess of 500 degrees F and pressures of 300 lbs per sq.cm. This has led Dr. Godfrey Louis (Head of Physics Dept, Cochin University) to believe that the cells must be of extraterrestrial origin, specifically from comets....

Fluorescence Mystery in Red Rain Cells of Kerala, India
Linda Moulton Howe
February 14, 2009, EarthFiles.com

--- End quote ---

RyanX:

--- Quote from: Galaxia2002 on February 27, 2009, 07:51:37 AM ---My point is, it is known that in the higher atmospheric regions there are layers of air which do not mix with each other,  and what I propose is that this could be a reservoir of microscopic life where high intensity sunlight could cause mutations including making  pathogenic or not organisms that have arrived there. Even this region could harbor potential microorganisms that come from the disintegration of meteors, but it is very questionable.
Well, my hypothesis is that if there would be this "static" reservoir it could be only seriously disturbed by either upward or downward currents of air, that with more probability would or wouldn´t be permitted in very mountainous regions.
Volcanoes could be a way to feed the reservoir with fresh material from earth, so I could say that not all the biological material can necessarily come from space.

--- End quote ---

Don't forget that it need not be only microorganisms making people sick.  Chemical changes in the atmosphere and general environment can create similar effects.  In Mike Baillie's book New Light on the Black Death he puts forth his own thoughts on this matter.  He claims that some of the chemical constituents of comets, such as hydrogen cyanide and poly-aromatic hydrocarbons, fit the etiology of many of the plague deaths. 

Not only this, but experiments carried out in the early 20th century showed some indication of the transmutation of bacteria based on their chemical environment.  The work of Edward Rosenow is interesting in this regard.

_http://www.rife.de/what_has_become_of_the_rife_microscope.html


--- Quote ---Kendall's work, however, attracted the rapt attention of the same Dr. Edward C. Rosenow who, in 1914, had been able to prove that strains of streptococcus were able, under the right conditions, to transmute one into the other. In that day he had written that these "conditions were more or less obscure. They seem to call forth new or latent energies which were previously not manifest and which now have gained the ascendency."

As a filtrationist, Rosenow was a maverick among bacteriologists up to his death at 94 in the 1960's. His work had convinced him, also prior to World War I, that organisms in sera - the fluids from tissues of immunized animals commonly used as antitoxins to neutralize microbes in the body - might in some patients have dangerous biological side effects.

The main implication of Rosenow's work in his own eyes was that bacteria were not as important to disease as the terrain on which they found themselves. "It would seem," he wrote in his 1914 article, "that focal infections are no longer to be looked upon merely as a place of entrance of bacteria but as a place where conditions are favorable for them to acquire the properties which give them a wide range of affinities for various structures."

--- End quote ---

Although, there was little progress or attempt to duplicate Rosenow's work, the idea that disease conditions aren't caused by microbes so much as they are caused by environmental conditions has not gone away.  Many of those who study natural medicine have come to similar conclusions.

My thoughts are that it can go both ways.  Some pathogens may just be stronger and able to survive a variety of environmental terrains, ultimately making them difficult to deal with.  Other pathogens may be less adapted and only able to seek out certain environments when the condition is ripe.  Disease endemics and pandemics may not always stem from a single cause as modern medicine would lead us to believe.  For instance, how would one take into account this recent assessment of the 1918 flu which shows the signs of a massive bacterial infection rather than a viral infection?

_http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSTRE5146PD20090205

I'm somewhat unfamiliar with the literature regarding atmospheric mixing or lack there of.  Do you have a link that discusses this? 

Ryan

Biomiast:
Hi to all,

As Pepperfritz and Galaxia said, there are micro organisms that can live at harsh conditions here on earth. They are generally called extremophiles and it is a very interesting subject. In a sense, we are like them, people who tries to function, survive and evolve in a world that is designed to drain our energy. They have mechanisms to survive in those environments like special proteins and cellular structures. We also have our different techniques.

As for Galaxia's hypothesis, it can be true. If there are micro organisms who live in air, why can not they live in different regions of atmosphere? May be they do not need the gases or chemicals here. As for entry issue, the micro organism can design a defence mechanism like being dormant for a time and become alive when the conditions are suitable.

I also think, as Ruth suggested, there is a connection between people's immune system and other bodily chemicals including hormones and natural disasters. This may be the cause of their susceptibility to the micro organisms either coming from atmosphere or already existing.

I also wonder the composition of atmosphere as RyanX suggested. My initial thought was that there can be some ionic force based on the composition of cellular components of micro organisms. This may hold this biologic layer in its place. 

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page