> Imho, when someone is looking at an organism that could be a 
> candidate for
> (rapid) panspermia at least in the solar system, look no 
> further. These guys and a few hardy extremophile bacteria or 
> algae they could feed on frozen in a meteorite slammed out of 
> some planet with H2O (by another meteorite) and slamming into 
> some planet with H2O within 10 years or so and there's your 
> panspermia in action.
> 
> I used to think that the sterilization done to spacecraft 
> before sending them off to other planets is overkill. Not 
> anymore. And, in fact, I think that normal sterilization will 
> not get these guys. Withstand 150 degC ? Oops, we may have 
> been involved in panspermia. But now it is easy to find proof ;-)
> 
> Peter P.


That's why the Galileo spacescraft was crashed into Jupiter, not Europa.

The bugs might like it there.  Besides, Mr Clarke said we shouldn't.

Tony

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