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Is this alien life? Controversial scientists publish second paper claiming they have found 'extra-terrestrial fossils' in meteor fragment
- New paper reiterates claims made in January that meteorite contains traces of life from outer space
- It reportedly landed in Sri Lanka in December after burning green in the sky, leaving bystanders with burns
- Critics rubbish claims, saying that the researchers methodology is 'even flakier' than in first paper - and they have not ruled out contamination
By DAMIEN GAYLE
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Algae-like structures found inside fragments of a meteorite which struck Sri Lanka last year prove that life exists elsewhere in the Universe, a new study claims.
A paper by an international team of scientists, their second on the subject, makes the extraordinary claim that electron microscope images of the rocks have revealed tiny fossilised life forms from outer space.
The authors are convinced that their findings offer firm evidence of panspermia, the hypothesis that life exists throughout the Universe and is spread by meteoroids, asteroids and planetoids.
From outer space? This electron microscope image of a meteor fragment shows a microfossil of extraterrestrial origin, a study claims
The microorganism that fell to Earth: This picture shows a close up of the point marked (b) in the image above: The paper claims that the rock in which these were found came from a meteor which landed in Sri Lanka
Undeniably organic? The paper reiterates claims first made in January in an earlier study led by controversial scientist Chandra Wickramasinghe
However, sceptics are already lining up to pour scorn on their methodology.
MailOnline first reported in January the claims by Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe, of the Buckingham Centre for Astrobiology, that investigations of the meteorite had revealed evidence of alien life.
He is joint author of a new study, just published in the Journal of Cosmology, which reiterates the controversial claims on the basis of a new analysis of the rocks.
The paper tells how on the evening of December 29 last year a bright yellow fireball lit up the skies over Polonnaruwa, Sri Lanka, turning green as it disintegrated on entry into the Earth's atmosphere.
Blazing hot, sparkling fragments rained down on the villages and paddy fields below, according to reports, leaving some witnesses with burns and giving off fumes with a strong odour of asphalt.
Local police collected samples of the curious rocks and handed them to the Medical Research Institute of the Sri Lankan Ministry of Health, who then passed them on to researchers at Cardiff University for further analysis, the study says.
In total Jamie Wallis, of Cardiff's School of Mathematics, and colleagues received 628 fragments purportedly from the meteorite - three of which, they say, were 'clearly identified as possible meteorites'.
In the latest study, the researchers make the extraordinary claim than these three rocks contain fossilised biological structures fused into the rock matrix.
Furthermore, they say, their tests have ruled out the possibility of terrestrial contamination.
The team published electron microscope images of structures within the stones which they say show a complex, thick-walled, carbon-rich microfossil about 100 micrometres across.
Another image, they say, shows well-preserved flagella 100 micrometres long but only two micrometres in diameter.
Claims: Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe with the fragment of space rock in which the fossils were found
Evidence for ET? Critics say that even if the rock was indeed from outer space, research into it has failed to prove that the traces of life apparently found are not the result of contamination here on Earth
The researchers interpret that unusual long and thin configuration 'as indicating a low-gravity, low-pressure environment and rapid freeze-drying' - which could only happen in outer space.
A previous study, led by Professor Wickramasinghe and published in the Journal of Cosmology in January, also claimed to have found 'microscopic fossilized diatoms (a basic form of algae)' in the samples.
HOW DID RESEARCHERS GET HOLD OF THE 'SPACE ROCKS'?
'We got it from the medical research institute in Sri Lanka,' Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe told MailOnline.
'They got hold of it on the 29th December, when a fireball was seen in the area.
'Thousands of people spotted it, and minutes after there was a meteorite fall over a rice field.
'Farmers who rushed to pick up these stones had their hands burnt, and women fainted, so local medical staff and police were summoned to cordon off the area to collect the stones.
'One of these was sent to us by colleagues.'
However, the professor admitted at the time they the paper was a rush job and he and his colleagues did not have time to conduct the necessarily analyses to confirm it was a meteorite.
To make up for that omission, in the latest study Wallis and his colleagues also measured the chemical make up of the samples to determine their origin, claiming that low levels of nitrogen rule our the possibility of contamination by modern organisms.
The researchers say their findings offer 'clear and convincing evidence that these obviously ancient remains of extinct marine algae found embedded in the Polonnaruwa meteorite are indigenous to the stones and not the result of post-arrival microbial contaminants.'
They add: 'The presence of fossilized biological structures provides compelling evidence in support of the theory of cometary panspermia first proposed over thirty years ago.'
The study backs up the claims of Professor Wickramasinghe's widely rubbished January paper which claimed to have found evidence of alien life in the same rocks.
Smoking gun? This scanning electron microscope image purports to show the tell-tale sign of a microscopic fossil
A mathematician by training, Professor Wickramasinghe, 74, claims microbes from outer space arrived on our planet from comets which then 'multiplied and seeded' to form our life 3.8billion years ago.
A CONTROVERSIAL ACADEMIC
Chandra Wickramasinghe is notorious as the only scientist to argue against evolution during the 1981 Arkansas legal case against the teaching of creationism in schools.
The 74-year-old Sri Lankan-born British mathematician obtained a PhD from Cambridge under the supervision of the late Sir Fred Hoyle.
The pair went on to collaborate on a body of work some credit with providing the basis of the field of astrobiology.
Their joint work on the infrared spectra of interstellar grains led to developing the hypothesis of panspermia, which proposes that cosmic dust in space and comets is partly organic - and may have 'seeded' life on Earth.
They further contended that extraterrestrial life forms continue to enter the Earth's atmosphere, and may be responsible for epidemic outbreaks, new diseases, and the genetic novelty necessary for macroevolution.
In 2003 he was joint signatory on a letter sent to The Lancet which suggested that the virus which causes SARS may not come from chickens, but could in fact be from outer space.
He was head of Cardiff University's Centre for Astrobiology until two years ago, when funding was withdrawn and he was dismissed from his post.
He also believes that pathogens like the SARS virus arrived here from deep space.
'We are all aliens - we share a cosmic ancestry,' he said at the time of the original study's publication.
'Each time a new planetary system forms a few surviving microbes find their way into comets.
'These then multiply and seed other planets.
'These latest finds are just more evidence to point to the overwhelming fact that life on Earth began on other worlds.'
Professor Wickramasinghe was head of Cardiff University's Centre for Astrobiology until two years ago when funding for the department was withdrawn and he was dismissed from his post.
The controversial professor, the only scientist to testify against evolution in the famous 1981 creationist trial in Arkansas, has since carried on the project as a private company and charity.
Critics have already lined up to rubbish the latest study's claims and to suggest that the methodology of the researchers was also flawed.
Phil Plait, author of Slate's Bad Astronomy blog, said: 'I read the paper, and really it’s more of the same as from the first paper.
'In some ways, it’s even shakier; they provide lots of technical data that gives their work a veneer of credibility, but when you look a bit deeper you find they didn’t do a lot of critically necessary tests to establish the veracity of their claims.'
Controversial: Professor Wickramasinghe, left, says the still-smoking rocks were found after they fell in Sri Lanka, right, after a dramatic meteor shower
Plait claims the tests undertaken by Wallis and his colleagues did not go far enough to confirm that the rock samples they analysed were in fact from the meteor that appeared over Sri Lanka in December, and, even if they were from space, the analysis was insufficient to eliminate the possibility of contamination here on Earth.
THE PANSPERMIA HYPOTHESIS
Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe is a leading proponent of panspermia, the hypothesis that life exists throughout the Universe and is spread by meteoroids, asteroids and planetoids.
Panspermia proposes that life forms that can survive the effects of space, such as extremophiles, become trapped in debris that is ejected into space after collisions between asteroids and planets that harbour life.
These life-forms may travel dormant for an extended amount of time before colliding randomly with other planets or intermingling with protoplanetary disks.
If met with ideal conditions on a new planet's surfaces, the bacteria become active and the process of evolution begins, it is believed.
He points out that another meteorite fell to Earth in the same area in 2004 and any samples picked up could have in fact been from this event - long enough ago for the rocks to have become thoroughly contaminated.
And he adds that nowhere in the latest paper do the researchers indicate that they have undertaken the usual precautions to minimise findings which may have been caused by contamination.
'So, they find some rocks, they claim (without enough evidence) that they're meteorites, and they claim (without evidence) they're from a recent meteorite fall,' says Plait. 'They find diatoms, and they claim (without controlling for contamination) that not only these diatoms came from space, but that meteorites like this seeded Earth with life.
'Which is more likely: that, or that they found a rock from Earth that already had diatoms in it?'
When Professor Wickramasinghe's January paper was published, Monica Grady, professor of Planetary Sciences at the Open University’s Faculty of Science, told MailOnline she found the whole thing ‘laughable’.
‘There are serious inconsistencies with the data presented in the paper,' she said.
‘The most important is that the rock they have found is yet to be proven to be a meteorite.
‘Until that is done, no credence can be placed on the findings presented, especially when they are published in a non-mainstream journal.'
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