APOD: Blue Comet PanSTARRS (2018 Jan 12)

Comments and questions about the APOD on the main view screen.
User avatar
Ann
4725 Å
Posts: 13430
Joined: Sat May 29, 2010 5:33 am

Re: APOD: Blue Comet PanSTARRS (2018 Jan 12)

Post by Ann » Sun Jan 21, 2018 5:43 am

[c]Colorful bacteria in Yellowstone's Grand Prismatic Spring.
Photo: Charles O'Rear/Corbis[/c]
A geobiologist at the University of Lund near my hometown of Malmö has just published a paper where she claims that it was a mutation that allowed organisms to tolerate and make use of oxygen that sparked the Cambrian explosion. In her opinion, if that mutation had happened earlier, large animals would have existed at an earlier era.

Conversely, if that mutation hadn't happened, we would all still have been bacteria.

Ann
Color Commentator

User avatar
rstevenson
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Posts: 2705
Joined: Fri Mar 28, 2008 1:24 pm
Location: Halifax, NS, Canada

Re: APOD: Blue Comet PanSTARRS (2018 Jan 12)

Post by rstevenson » Sun Jan 21, 2018 7:03 pm

Ann wrote:Conversely, if that mutation hadn't happened, we would all still have been bacteria.
I'm guessing you'd be blue bacteria, Ann.

Rob

User avatar
Ann
4725 Å
Posts: 13430
Joined: Sat May 29, 2010 5:33 am

Re: APOD: Blue Comet PanSTARRS (2018 Jan 12)

Post by Ann » Sun Jan 21, 2018 7:19 pm

rstevenson wrote:
Ann wrote:Conversely, if that mutation hadn't happened, we would all still have been bacteria.
I'm guessing you'd be blue bacteria, Ann.

Rob
You bet! Image

Ann
Color Commentator

Post Reply