The new bacteria tell us that life can be weirder than we can imagine.

"Rice scientists found bacteria that breathe by releasing electricity, revealing a natural process with major clean tech potential. (Artist’s concept.) Credit: SciTechDaily.com" (ScitechDaily, Scientists Discover Bizarre Bacteria That “Breathe” Electricity Instead of Air)

If we want to find alien life, we don't need to search for it from another planet. We can find bizarre creatures on our planet. The electricity-breathing bacteria is a good example of that thing. 

Bacteria that breathe electricity instead of air can make new biosensors possible. Those bacteria push electrons into their surroundings. This allows them to eliminate the need for oxygen. This kind of bacteria can turn anaerobic environments and processes more effective. That kind of bacteria can keep those ecosystems in balance. That makes those bacteria very effective tools in bio- and nanotechnology. 

But it can also help to make models. About another planet's possible biospheres. The bacteria that don't need free oxygen are possible. There is lots of oxygen in the water. That means that bacteria must only break water molecules in their cell organelles so that they can live in water worlds. The thing is that those kinds of lifeforms can exist. 

"Possible signs of life on a distant planet? Not so fast. New research shows the signal might just be ordinary molecules, not alien biology. Credit: SciTechDaily.com" (ScitechDaily, Is It Alien Life – or Just Ethane? Scientists Reassess Webb Telescope Discovery)

"This artist’s impression shows what the faraway planet K2-18b, its host star and an accompanying planet in this system might look like. A new University of Chicago analysis has cast doubt on an earlier finding that concluded data showed evidence for life on the planet. Credit: ESA/Hubble, M. Kornmesser" (ScitechDaily, Is It Alien Life – or Just Ethane? Scientists Reassess Webb Telescope Discovery). 

The problem with that thing is distance. That means that life on that planet remains open. And we can discuss that thing endlessly. There was a little bit of ethane and dimethyl phosphine in the spectral analysis. Chemists can produce those compounds in the laboratory but they are also formed in biological processes. 

That means they might be far from things that we used to think or see. When we think about planets that are more than hundreds of light years away from Earth. We cannot be sure if there are some life forms. Before we visit that planet. The JWST telescope's new observations are things that cause discussions and divide opinions. The new observations tell us that those molecules can be just ethane, not biological processes. And then again, what were they before? 

There was ethane on some exoplanet (K2-18b) and that's it. Confirming those alien creatures' existence or non-existence requires far more advanced methods than even the JWST telescope can give. The JWST is an impressive tool. But it cannot find bacteria over hundreds of light years. On earth, ethane forms in biological processes. But it's possible to create that compound in the laboratory. 

The sign of dimethyl sulfide was much weaker than the ethane. But the main question is, why is that signal so weak? Did light travel through something that we cannot see? There are many things and a great distance between K2-18b and Earth. That means the measurements are difficult. Distance to that object is 124 ly. That means we see things that happened 124 years ago. And the primitive lifeforms are always hard to detect. 

But when we think about the bacteria that replace air using electricity. We face an interesting possibility. There is the possibility that somewhere on some other planet live organisms that use electricity to produce oxygen from their environment using electric processes. Theoretically bacteria or, why not, more complicated lifeforms can produce oxygen by using electric processes. The bacteria must have the ability to break water molecules in their cell organelles. That can happen by using electrolysis. 

Those kinds of organisms are not living on Earth. But maybe those things can live in some planet's atmosphere if there is enough water vapor. Those electric-eat bacteria should be investigated more because they could explain why some people are so tired. If that kind of bacteria is near the nervous system, it can make low voltage or disturb electric signals in the nervous channel or axons.

https://scitechdaily.com/is-it-alien-life-or-just-ethane-scientists-reassess-webb-telescope-discovery/

https://scitechdaily.com/scientists-discover-bizarre-bacteria-that-breathe-electricity-instead-of-air/

There are many problems to search for extraterrestrial life forms.

"Artist’s conception of an M dwarf planetary system, where methyl bromide is more likely to be detected. Credit: NASA/JPL/Caltech" (SciTechDaily.com/ A Better Way To Search for Extraterrestrial Life)

If extraterrestrial lifeform is primitive like algae or bacteria researchers must search for the products of those organisms' metabolism. And the biggest problem is that exoplanets that can host life are very far away.

Researchers have no information on what kind of creatures they should search for. Or what those primitive aliens are eating. Without any bacteria, samples are very hard to make any kind of model that those researchers must search for. 

And for those models, the researchers must use terrestrial bacteria as the model. So when we are thinking of those hypothetical bacteria as organisms that lived billions of years on some planet those organisms would be fully adapted to their home planet. 

In some scenarios in the deep oceans of some exoplanets live organisms with the capacity to make oxygen by using electric cells and electrolysis. But even if those extraterrestrial fishes seem like fish they don't have any other connections with fishes on Earth. Except both of those organisms are living in the water. 

There is a possibility that some extraterrestrial aliens have green or red skin. That makes their skin photosynthetic. The green skin means the alien species would have chlorophyll in its skin cells. And red skin means that the alien has the same molecule. That makes purple photosynthetic bacteria photosynthetic. 

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There is the possibility that we already have alien transmissions. But we cannot separate the data from cosmic background noise. 

That is one of the most interesting scenarios of the SETI program. Things like BLC-1 and Wow! signals are interesting. And the problem is that they happened only once. 

But the fact is that use of hydrogen's alpha line frequency is ineffective for data communication. In that frequency, the cosmic background noise disturbs information. And at least high-speed encoded data transmission is very difficult by using the hydrogen line's frequency. 

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But when we are searching for an intelligent alien civilization. We must understand that the search for those aliens is a very difficult mission. Even if aliens use radio transmissions for communication by using synthetic radio frequencies searching for those aliens is extremely difficult. 

And the reason for that is that radio astronomers have no permission to listen to those frequencies. Listening to synthetic radio frequencies is prohibited because of data security. This thing is one of the biggest problems in the SETI program. The synthetic radio frequencies are allowing better change for everyday data transmission than hydrogen's alpha emission line. 

But for some reason, we just expect that hypothetical aliens are keeping contact with each other by using hydrogen lines in communication. That thing causes very bad disturbance for those radio transmissions. Of course, aliens must use the numeric system that we know that we can even separate the alien transmission from the background noise. 

There is the possibility that we have alien messages but we cannot recognize them. So we cannot separate that purpose information from background noise. And the reason for that is we have no key to alien data transmission. But there is no confirmation for that allegation. And that is only a hypothesis. 

https://scitechdaily.com/a-better-way-to-search-for-extraterrestrial-life/

Salt can be key to extraterrestrial life.

The salty oceans stay liquid at a lower temperature than water where is no salt. So salty oceans can offer a place where microscopic lifeforms can create. But there is also the possibility that the alien organisms can form in crystal water. Salt also involves sodium that can deliver energy. 

Also, sodium is an important component in mammals' neural systems, or rather saying sodium channels that are important for functions of neurons require sodium. So intelligent aliens require salt for their sodium channels if their neural system is similar to ours. 

So if the alien has a similar neural structure to humans or mammals. That means they also need sodium for their neural system. On Earth, mammals are taking sodium from the salt. Pure sodium reacts very fast and roughly with water. But if sodium is connected with chloride that thing forms the salt molecule that is not so dangerous. 

That crystal water can be in the pocket of the salt crystals. And there can form some kind of primitive organisms. But the salt can also create conditions where osmosis will transfer liquids between the cell and its environment. So maybe someday we will see the first alien organisms swimming in a salty ocean or crystal water on some distant world. 

https://www.bna.org.uk/mediacentre/news/the-role-of-sodium-channels/

https://scitechdaily.com/salt-might-be-the-key-to-extraterrestrial-life/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_channel

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_chloride

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osmosis

Image: https://scitechdaily.com/salt-might-be-the-key-to-extraterrestrial-life/