All About UFO's

[Axo1989]

Fair enough. I’ll admit I have not dug into this deeply enough to give an objective take on it.

One-and-a half-hours vs the pattern of long-form click-bait posted in this thread? Nobody would blame you.

 

[Taiga]

Life began on Earth in the oceans as gummy fish. They letter evolved to move on land as gummy worms.

 

[terryforsythe]

I agree with what the article actually says. Ribose, glucose, amino acids, and nucleobases are interesting findings, but none of this is RNA, and RNA was never mentioned in the paper or in NASA’s summary. These are simple chemical building blocks we have also seen in other meteorites for decades.

Watch the video. Otherwise we are just talking in circles. Dr. Benner explains the importance of the finding of six-carbon glucose with regard to RNA.

 

[terryforsythe]

I agree with what the article actually says. Ribose, glucose, amino acids, and nucleobases are interesting findings, but none of this is RNA, and RNA was never mentioned in the paper or in NASA’s summary. These are simple chemical building blocks we have also seen in other meteorites for decades.

I'll make it easy for you. Here is where Dr. Benner discusses the importance of six-carbon glucose to RNA:

 

[terryforsythe]

• NASA did not find RNA or anything close to RNA. They found simple sugars and organics.
Source: NASA press release

Nobody, not Dr. Benner, not the host John Michael Godier, and not me, claimed RNA was found on Bennu, or anywhere else outside of Earth. So, I don't understand why you keep harping on the fact that RNA was not found on the asteriod. That is a moot point and not the point of the interview. The point is that six-carbon glucose was found, for the first time on an extraterrestrial object, and Dr. Benner explains the importance of that finding with regard to RNA.

This conversation is but one more example of someone critisizing a video without watching the video nor even understanding the video's subject matter well enough to form a valid rebuttal to the video's content. You have provided links to numerous papers, but you have not articulated how any of those papers contradict anything Dr. Benner said in the interview.

Now, if you have a citation to a scientific paper establishing that glucose has no relevance to RNA, then that would contradict what Dr. Benner discusses. Then, we could have a valid conversation about the interview.

 

[Axo1989]

Nobody, not Dr. Benner, not the host John Michael Godier, and not me, claimed RNA was found on Bennu, or anywhere else outside of Earth. So, I don't understand why you keep harping on the fact that RNA was not found on the asteriod. That is a moot point and not the point of the interview. The point is that six-carbon glucose was found, for the first time on an extraterrestrial object, and Dr. Benner explains the importance of that finding with regard to RNA.

This conversation is but one more example of someone critisizing a video without watching the video nor even understanding the video's subject matter well enough to form a valid rebuttal to the video's content. You have provided links to numerous papers, but you have not articulated how any of those papers contradict anything Dr. Benner said in the interview.

Now, if you have a citation to a scientific paper establishing that glucose has no relevance to RNA, then that would contradict what Dr. Benner discusses. Then, we could have a valid conversation about the interview.

Pfft. Dr Benner looks/sounds like another of Terry’s avuncular goofballs tbh. I was bemused by the side-track into ‘carr-mell’ for a moment, then the sugar coma set in and I lost consciousness.

 

[WillBrink]

So Age Of Disclosure type documentary, this is essentially the same show. Same people saying the same things. Glad to see it, but we have hit a wall as far as next real movement toward disclosures and evidence being withheld by the gubment. For those who follow the topic, little will be learned here. For those who don't, want a decent summarized view of those involved, worth a view:

 

[mhardy6647]

speaking as a carbohydrate biochemist, glucose is interesting.

 

[terryforsythe]

So Age Of Disclosure type documentary, this is essentially the same show. Same people saying the same things. Glad to see it, but we have hit a wall as far as next real movement toward disclosures and evidence being withheld by the gubment. For those who follow the topic, little will be learned here. For those who don't, want a decent summarized view of those involved, worth a view:

Yesterday there was an interview of three Congress members, Representatives Luna, Burchett and Berlison, on Jeremy Corbell's YouTube Channel. Basically, more of the same, except Burlison discussed a list he is compiling of first-hand witnesses to the supossed reverse engineering program, but their task force does not have authority to subpoena them to testify before Congress. He is hoping to convince his "boss" (I presume James Comer, the Chair of the Oversight Committee) to authorize subpoenas. Luna also indicated that she is working an avenue to get the alleged witnesses subpoenaed.

Regardless of what is the truth, the UAP issue is bringing attention to serious issues. We are hearing conflicting stories from our government, which reduces trust. And, we keep hearing how our government is increasing transparency but, according to Luna, Burchett and Berlison, the veil over the UAP issue is being kept in place. Government documents obtained under FOIA by The Black Vault support their contention.

 

[WillBrink]

Tangential, and increases likelihood life is not unique to Earth:

"How did the molecular building blocks of life arrive at early Earth? To find out, NASA sent a spacecraft called OSIRIS-REx to collect samples from the carbon-rich asteroid Bennu. Now, a team of Japanese and US scientists have discovered the bio-essential sugars ribose and glucose within the Bennu samples. RNA uses ribose for its structure. Glucose provides cells with energy and is used to make fibers like cellulose, a structural component of cell walls. The discovery suggests that these simple sugars were brought to the early Earth by meteorites. In this interview, OSIRIS-REx Project Scientist Daniel Glavin discusses the discovery of ribose and glucose in the Bennu samples and the implications for the formation and evolution of life."

And:

Bio-essential sugars in samples from asteroid Bennu - Nature Geoscience

Samples returned from asteroid Bennu contain bio-essential sugars such as ribose and glucose that may have formed in the parent asteroid from brines containing formaldehyde, according to a geochemical study.

www.nature.com

 

[voodooless]

We already covered that last page…

 

[Axo1989]

We already covered that last page…

Seems Will doesn’t really read the thread? Not startling.

 

[mhardy6647]

Did they find D-glucose (the biologically relevant stereoisomer, at least for life as we know it ), or a racemic mixture? Or isomerically pure L-glucose, for that matter? Life, generally speaking, cares about stereisomerism.

fun sugar nerd fact: D-glucose is the most abundant organic molecule (on earth, that is).

 

[WillBrink]

Did they find D-glucose, or a racemic mixture? Or isomerically pure L-glucose, for that matter? Life, generally speaking, cares about stereisomerism.

Did you read the paper in J.Nature?

 

[mhardy6647]

Did you read the paper in J.Nature?

Does it look like I did? Any one who read it will know.

 

[mhardy6647]

Otherwise, by all means, post a direct link to the paper and I will skim it.

 

[Taiga]

Did they find D-glucose (the biologically relevant stereoisomer, at least for life as we know it ), or a racemic mixture? Or isomerically pure L-glucose, for that matter? Life, generally speaking, cares about stereisomerism.

fun sugar nerd fact: D-glucose is the most abundant organic molecule (on earth, that is).

Wow. Just had a flashback to P-Chem III with my little kit of sticks and balls. Not to mention the combined odor of caraway oil and sweaty lab goggles in Organic Chem I.

Everything looked like a UAP after wearing those goggles over a hot flask. Is that the conclusion of the Nature article?

 

[WillBrink]

One step closer to Warp drives? Dr. Hossenfelder is not impressed with latest paper:

"Warp drives are science fiction technology that allow spaceships to travel faster than the speed of light. Physicists have tried to make sense of this by contracting the space in front and expanding the space behind the ship. In a new paper, a former NASA scientist outlines how we can engineer such warp drives. Really? Let’s take a look."

 

[mhardy6647]

I guess I was bored enough to find the paper*.

Bio-essential sugars in samples from asteroid Bennu - Nature Geoscience

Samples returned from asteroid Bennu contain bio-essential sugars such as ribose and glucose that may have formed in the parent asteroid from brines containing formaldehyde, according to a geochemical study.

www.nature.com

So... yeah... mass spectrometry, which is blind to stereochemistry. OK, not exactly, as there are techniques now, and tricks we've played for decades, to assess stereochemistry, usually by either clever chemistry before analysis (e.g., the ancient and venerable "Smith degradation"/analysis of partially methylated alditol acetates), and/or fragmentation (nowadays, by multidimensional "MS^n"** approaches). But all of the aldohexoses have the same mass, as they differ only in the arrangement of the atoms (C, H, and O) from which they are formed. Glucose, Mannose, Galactose are all of the same molecular weight, but are all very different biologically.

The paper is quite clear that they have no clue on the crucial stereochemistry issues for organic molecules such as amino acids and sugars.

it looks like their working hypothesis is that these molecules are abiotic, so these represent primordial organic molecules -- cf. the 'origin of life' experiments by folks like Stanley Miller.

So... we're a long way from UFOs here. A long way.

_____________________
* more like a displacement activity.
** "mass spectrometry to the nth power", so to speak.

 

[mhardy6647]

Just a couple of tidbits on monosaccharide stereochemistry from my own lectures on the topic(s)

Chemical syntheses often (not always!) produce both flavors of stereoisomers when they have a choice (so to speak): a mixture of the two isomers of one chiral carbon is called a racemic mixture. Biological systems (enzyme catalysis) produce one stereoisomer. For example, all of the amino acids found in protein are of the "L" form; no D/L racemic mixtures. All of the common aldohexoses (Galactose, Glucose, Mannose) are of the "D" form, not racemic D/L mixtures. It's a hallmark of biosynthesis.

Galactose, Glucose, and Mannose all have the same molecular composition (C6H12O6), differing only in the way those atoms are hooked together. There are both D and L forms of each, too.

Here's D-glucose, in its "aldopyranose" (ring) form -- as most commonly encountered in a biological context.

(the hydrogen atoms aren't shown, for clarity). This is the beta form (thermodynamically the most stable due to the orientation of those OH groups); the alpha form "flips" the OH group at carbon 1. L-glucose would flip the configuration at all of the chiral (asymmetrically modified) carbons. alpha-L-glucose is the 'perfect' mirror image of beta-D-glucose.

Since sugars have multiple, chemically active sites, there are lots of different ways to link them together. If we take three sugars of the same mass (e.g., Gal, Glc, Man, the same three mentioned above), there are, on paper, 1056 different ways to hook them together (they do NOT all occur naturally). Those trisaccharides all have the same mass.

We can start to play tricks such as the aforementioned "MS^n" (fragmentation analysis) to tease apart these "isobaric" (same mass) species.