Is vacuum-based life possible?

Danger Mouse

Danger Mouse
Found this old photo in my exploration album. An ammonia world with ammonia-based life but the twist is, the planet has no atmosphere. Zip, nada. But life found a way! Could these be the galaxys most hardcore aliens? Check it out, theres no air down there.

wierdplanet.jpg

Probably full of rock-monsters like in Galaxy Quest. Or maybe some gelatinous cubes perhaps? I want to land on this planet but I forget where it is. It was around somewhere around Pleiades/California I think. Has anyone found an ELW with no atmosphere?
 

Captain Torus

Captain Torus
Danger Mouse said:
Found this old photo in my exploration album. An ammonia world with ammonia-based life but the twist is, the planet has no atmosphere. Zip, nada. But life found a way! Could these be the galaxys most hardcore aliens? Check it out, theres no air down there.

View attachment 56681

Probably full of rock-monsters like in Galaxy Quest. Or maybe some gelatinous cubes perhaps? I want to land on this planet but I forget where it is. It was around somewhere around Pleiades/California I think. Has anyone found an ELW with no atmosphere?
Click to expand...
Sure why not, we are playing a vacuum based game :)
 

newman1702

newman1702
Life on a planet with no atmo doesn't equate to life in hard vacuum - life would most likely be present underground, possibly in liquid deposits, where it could retain heat and be shielded from solar radiation. I doubt you'll find alien dinosaurs on an airless world, we're likely looking at microbial life :)

As for ELW's with no atmo, one of the things that define an earth like world is an earth-like feature; oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere. We call them Earth like because they're like Earth :) if you ever found an airless ELW it'd be a reportable glitch in gal generation, one they would probably fix when reported. The simplest way to think about this is - a planet is an ELW if you can land and walk around without a suit. The surface air pressure may be a bit off, it could be a bit nippy or a bit too tropical hot, gravity may not be what we're used to - but everything would be within human norms, if not necessarily comfortable.
 
Last edited:

goemon

goemon
there is a rare good - Baltha'sine Vacuum Krill - creatures living in the icy rings of one of baltha'sies planets. so, even icy rings can bear life!


"Vacuum Krill are astonishing creatures. One of the few species to live in the hard vacuum of space, they are native to the ice rings around Baltah'sine 4b. Their eggs grow in vast numbers in tiny water pockets within the rocks - kept liquid by secretions from the mother when the eggs are first laid. When mature, they eventually burrow their way out, propelling themselves between rocks with tiny excretions of fluid, in search of a mate."
 

Ziljan

Ziljan
There are water worlds with no atmosphere and yet they have water based life. This is no different, except the oceans are made out of ammonia rather than water.

As for true vacuum based life: we have discovered giant clouds of hydrocarbons like alcohol floating in space where each molecule of alcohol is about 1m apart. That is a better vacuum than anything ever created on earth, and yet alcohol still formed in giant clouds over eons and eons of extremely unlikely interactions. If you give these collisions enough time, then as long as the required material is there, why rule out evolution of life in a "vacuum"?
 
Last edited:

Sire

Sire
Lots of people live with pneumatic vacuum in their head experiencing no issues so the answer is definitely yes.
 

Pulchrit Ataraxis

P
newman1702 said:
Life on a planet with no atmo doesn't equate to life in hard vacuum - life would most likey be present underground, possibly in liquid deposits, where it could retain heat and be shielded from solar radiation. I doubt you'll find alien dinosaurs on an airless world, we're likely looking at microbial life :)

As for ELW's with no atmo, one of the things that define an earth like world is an earth-like feature - oxygen nitrogen atmosphere. We call then Earth like because they're like Earth :) if you ever found an airless ELW it'd be a reportable glitch in gal generation, one they would probably fix when reported.
Click to expand...

+1 for you. That is exactly the way to look at it. Also, never forget the Tardigrades.
 

newman1702

newman1702
Ziljan said:
There are water worlds with no atmosphere and yet they have water based life. The is no different, except the oceans are made out of ammonia rather than water.

As for true vacuum based life: we have discovered giant clouds of hydrocarbons like alcohol floating in space where each molecule of alcohol is about 1m apart. That is a better vacuum than anything ever created on earth, and yet alcohol still formed in giant clouds over eons and eons of extremely unlikely interactions. If you give these collisions enough time, then as long as the required material is there, why rule out evolution of life in a "vacuum"?
Click to expand...

It's definitely interesting how our definition of life gets expanded as we learn more. Right now we have a limited point of reference - Earth - as we found no life on other worlds yet. It's one of my high hopes that we'll find some traces of life elsewhere during my lifetime (Europa, Enceladus, Titan, even Mars volcanic tubes / caves - I'm looking at you). Our current understanding of life, more precisely how it's formed, is limited - we understand how amino acids form, but the spark that actually creates life is not something we can positively identify just yet.

The example you gave with alcohol molecules is a good example of us not being able to answer with a definite yes or no - can life form in this environment? If we answered that with a yes it would be proof that the universe is teeming with life, as far as I'm concerned. So much stuff to yet discover..

(that reminds me:

I've experiments to run
There is research to be done
On the people who are
STILL ALIVE)

(it is a gaming forum, after all :D)
 
Last edited:

MarcusVatta

MarcusVatta
One of the best candidates for life (other than Earth) in our solar system is Europa, which has no atmosphere. Ammonia Freezes at -77C (at 1 atmo. Anyone know the math for no atmo?) so I'd guess it's the same as Europa: life in oceans capped by ice.
 

Space Fan

Banned
S
Michael Brookes said:
Plasma based lifeforms have been a favourite topic of mine recently.

Michael
Click to expand...

Lovely idea, but difficult to form chemical bonds necessary for the complex molecules of life using the ionised atoms of a plasma !

Edit: should probably have written impossible rather than difficult !
 
Last edited:

Michael Brookes

Game Director
Space Fan said:
Lovely idea, but difficult to form chemical bonds necessary for the complex molecules of life using the ionised atoms of a plasma !

Edit: should probably have written impossible rather than difficult !
Click to expand...

The trick is to use dust in plasma flows - the energised flows between Jupiter and Io are a possible source. They could even form replicable helical structures :) I doubt you'd get intelligent life, but something analogous to single celled lifeforms is possible.

Michael
 

Space Fan

Banned
S
Michael Brookes said:
The trick is to use dust in plasma flows - the energised flows between Jupiter and Io are a possible source. They could even form replicable helical structures :) I doubt you'd get intelligent life, but something analogous to single celled lifeforms is possible.

Michael
Click to expand...

Plasma flow as a stimulus for the creation of organic molecules => eventual life. I could go with that!

There would certainly be an energy input, which is always good :)

Edit: the plasma effectively a conduit, carrying non-ionised matter (the dust) which combines under the energetic conditions.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom