It’s a Wonderful Life, The Little Drummer Boy, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, all popular classic Christmas movies. Elf, Jingle all the Way, The Polar Express, popular new Christmas movies.
It’s hard to say which movie is Penn Manor’s favorite and which new Christmas movie will become a future classic. There is no real answer since students have many opinions.
Penn Manor students were handed a list of the “most popular” Christmas movies out there.
The list consisted of National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, The Nightmare Before Christmas, A Christmas Story, White Christmas, It’s a Wonderful Life, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, A Charlie Brown Christmas, A Christmas Carol, The Little Drummer Boy, Miracle on 34th Street, The Polar Express, Jack Frost, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, Elf, Jingle All The Way, The Santa Claus, Frosty the Snowman, and Home Alone.
Fifty percent of the Penn Manor students asked about their favorite Christmas movie said that A Christmas Story was their favorite. Others voted the top movies being Jingle All The Way, Elf, Home Alone and The Nightmare Before Christmas.
One of Jere Vital's favorite movies is Jingle All The Way. Photo by Jenna Reel
Senior Cory Lentz said his favorite movie is Elf.
“Will Farrell is the man. The best part is when he’s in the mall and sees Santa then yells, ‘Santa!'” said Lentz.
“A Christmas Story is my favorite. The best part is when Ralphie beats up the bully and he curses, then gets his mouth washed out with soap,” said junior Joey Jackson. “I think its funny and weird to have a Christmas movie with a young kid. It makes the story line different.”
Senior Jere Vital claims to have two favorite movies.
“Jingle All The Way, which I have on VHS tape, and Home Alone are my favorites. (In Home Alone) I always felt like that kid, Kevin. I thought I could take out the bad guys. My favorite part in Jingle All The Way is when Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character gets in the red turbo man suit and flies around saying, ‘It’s turbo time,'” said Vital.
Edward Gahring, a sophomore at Penn Manor, agrees with Vital in claiming his favorite movie being Home Alone.
A Christmas Story is a Penn Manor favorite. Photo credit to http://tvtropes.org
“Its exciting to watch. The funniest parts are where the little kid is always fooling the adult. The best part in the whole movie is when the old man comes in and knocks out the bandits with the shovel in the flooded house,” said Gahring.
Both sophomores, Kaitlyn Thomas and Cobi Kremer, say their favorite movie is A Christmas Story because its funny.
Thomas remembers the part in which the boy licks the pole and his tongue gets stuck, and Kremer remembers the shoe/hooker leg lamp.
“It makes me laugh,” said Kremer.
A movie becomes one’s favorite because there are parts of the movie that stand out to them and make it memorable. Some families watch the same movies every year as tradition, and some have other traditions.
Taylor Hager, another sophomore at Penn Manor, said that she has watched The Holiday every year since it first came out (in 2006).
Many people still disagree though about which movies are better. Newer ones or classics?
Home Alone is predicted to be a Classic. Photo credit to http://www.allstarpics.net
“Older ones are so much better,” said Jackson.
“I like old ones better. There’s nothing better than an old, good movie. New ones try and pack in too much stuff,” said Gahring.
“The classic 90s colored movies are the best,” said Vital.
Others argue that new ones are better.
“Newer ones are better. Old ones are so fake,” said Thomas.
“I like the pictures in newer movies, so they’re better,” said Kremer.
Hager explains how she likes a good mix of new and old movies.
Whether they like the new or old, which new ones will become the classics?
Jackson, Gahring, Thomas, and Kremer all insist that Home Alone will become a classic.
Mattel has come out with a brand new accessory for Barbie just in time for Christmas this year. The big change? She has a built in camera with picture and video abilities. The new Barbie is causing major controversy, but not just with the consumers.
The FBI has put out a warning against Mattel’s new toy. They are worried it will encourage child pornography with the video and picture capturing options.
But, an FBI spokeswoman attended a news conference on the topic stated “there have been no reported incidents of this doll being used as anything other than as intended.”
Mattel’s new “Video Girl” Barbie. Photo courtesy of fast-autos.net
On the Mattel website, the toy description says, “girls can record and play back clips with this multi-tasking doll, which has a video camera built right in. Capture everything from a doll’s-eye-view, then watch it instantly or upload to your computer. There’s an LCD screen on Barbie doll’s back, and a camera lens hidden discreetly in her necklace. Talk about making movies in style!”
When Senior Anissa Gerlach heard about the doll she immediately responded with “What’s a little kid going to do with a camera in their Barbie? You’ll just get pictures of the floor!”
Gerlach also thinks that “parents could use the recording Barbies as nanny cameras,” and said “what a waste of technology!”
“I would be kind of creeped out,” said senior Patrick Jones. He feels like girl’s parents are unaware of everything that could potentially be result of this new product. “Do they even realize there’s a camera in her necklace that can take pictures and record video?”
Jones thinks the doll has good and bad points.
“It’s giving kids an early look into the technological future,” on the other hand, “older children or adults will do inappropriate things with the little kids.”
“In later stages (of life) kids will be more comfortable with the Internet and video chatting.”
Jones thinks Mattel’s next step will be dolls that are fully functional in ways such as walking, talking and live video streaming capabilities.
An internal view of "Video Girl" Barbie. Photo courtesy of gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com
Morgan Moses feels strongly about Mattel’s new creation.
She made it very clear that she would be angry if her 9-year-old sister received the Barbie with the built-in camera. “I don’t want her having Barbies [in general] because they’re degrading and she doesn’t need to be videoing herself. They (younger children) shouldn’t know how to video themselves.”
Moses, unaware of the FBI warnings recently made, is afraid of the “weapon” this supplies pedophiles with.
“Some guy could be sitting there with his daughter’s Barbie taping little kids. They’ll come up with anything.”
“It would be weird to have a child receive one of these dolls” and “there’s really no need to have a camera in a Barbie doll,” said Alanna Margoline.
Margoline said, “everything is becoming dependent on technology, even toys! What’s next? Cell phones for babies so they can text in the womb?”
Aside from consumers, the government is alerting police personnel as well, to ensure that items such as Barbies will not be overlooked when investigating a case. This is mainly because these electronic dolls could be holding crucial evidence inside their fake, plastic bodies.
But despite all the arguments and claims giving the doll a negative reputation, the manufacturers of the doll claim that “Mattel products are designed with children and their best interests in mind. Many of Mattel’s employees are parents themselves and we understand the importance of child safety – it is our number one priority.”
“Buckle your seat-belt, check your mirrors, don’t even think about touching your phone.”
My mom always reminds me of these things before starting up the car.
“If you think you need to text someone right now, you can turn your phone off and I’d be happy to take it from you,” she adds.
Learning how to drive, I thought, was supposed to be fun. I found out otherwise.
Every single second in the car with either my mom or my dad, was a nightmare.
I think the conclusion to where wrinkles and gray hair originate from is quite obvious. It appears having to teach your kids how to drive, takes years off of your life.
Dillon Walker
Insisting that nothing I’m doing is right, yelling when I do something that scares them slightly, or just sitting there with the expression on their face that the world is going to end, or we’re all going to die.
That is what I and other teenagers all over the world have to deal with.
And then parents expect us to be able to drive?
Taking some of the pressure off by not freaking out every five seconds, then possibly we can do what you yearn for us to do so badly. Drive the car.
Thankfully, after six months of driving, my parents finally started to breathe when they were in the car with me. The only part that really stinks is that it took them the entire six months to finally get comfortable.
The greatest day of my teenage life had to have been the day I drove my car out of the driveway without one other person in the car with me.
Excitement rushing through your veins, freedom blowing in your hair, and the sweet sound of JUST your stereo. Awesome. Now this is driving.
Penn Manor students and teachers are making cards for Wyatt Tietz who has life threatening cancer, to try and brighten his holidays.
Tietz’s mother, Heather Tietz graduated from Penn Manor in 1994. The family lives in Colorado where Tietz is currently receiving treatment at Brent’s place in Aurora, Colorado. He will be getting treatment every day for six weeks. The family returns to the area frequently to visit and even was here over the summer where they spent quality time with friends.
Tietz, at just 5-years-old, is battling cancer and his family is making an effort to make his holidays joyful. Along with his family, a few classes in Penn Manor have made an effort to make his holidays as happy as possible. Classes in Mr. Luft’s, Mr. McKnight’s and Mrs. Kroesen have made many cards so Tietz can have a card shower.
All students are encouraged to make cards so he can have a wonderful holiday season. Just see teachers Jen Kroesen or Denise Harris for more details on the matter.
The first lunar eclipse to happen during the winter solstice in 372 years has come and passed.
While most Penn Manor students were asleep for the action, a few faced the cold December night to experience it.
“It was interesting because the eclipse hasn’t happened on the winter solstice for a couple hundred years,” said Jess Huber, a junior who woke up to watch the epic eclipse unfold. “I’ve never seen the moon look that kind of orange before.”
A lunar eclipse is when the moon passes through the shadow of the earth cast by the sun, which then blocks the light to the moon. This eclipse was momentous due to the fact that it hasn’t fallen on the longest night of the year, the winter solstice, since 1638.
The stages of last night's lunar eclipse. Photo courtesy of sacredtravel.wordpress.com
Because the eclipse fell on the winter solstice, the moon appeared “very high in the night sky, as the solstice marks the time when Earth’s axial tilt is farthest away from the sun,” a NASA spokesperson said.
This eclipse turned the moon a “blood red color for more than an hour” according to NASA.
The red appearance is due to the atmosphere acting like a filtered lens and bending the red sunlight into earth’s shadow scattering out blue light. This is also why sunrises and sunsets appear red or orange as reported by Kevin Kehoe of astronomy.com.
Although this was a special occasion, not too many Penn Manor students considered it an exciting experience.
Junior Christina Stoltzfus sacrificed her good night’s sleep to see the magnificent event.
Junior Christina Stoltzfus imitates the moon. Photo by of Kyle Hallett
“It was breathtaking as the shadow slowly moved across the moon’s surface,” explained Stoltzfus. “I wanted to watch this since it was the first winter solstice lunar eclipse to happen during our generation.”
Earth Science teacher, David Bender, warned his students of the cloudy conditions and that it would be difficult to see the colorful moon.
Regardless of the rarity of the lunar eclipse on the day of winter solstice, most students said they would rather sleep than watch the moon disappear into the shadows.
“I prefer to sleep and I had a math test the next day,” said senior, Kelly McHugh.
It’s alright if you missed this experience Penn Manor, it will take place again in another 84 years
Penn Manor showed Ephrata who was king of the mountain Monday.
The girls basketball game was a battle throughout the entire game, as it stayed close even with numerous lead changes. Both teams wanted to get some cushioning because they both knew it was going to be a close one.
Shots didn’t seem to be going their way as the Comets started to fall behind in the first quarter. Ephrata’s defense was playing well with a number of blocked shots and rebounds in the first quarter.
The second quarter was taken over by Penn Manor junior Megan Schlegelmilch. Drawing fouls, and scoring 10 points in the 2nd quarter alone, Manor spirited to the top by one point going into halftime.
The Comets came out in the third quarter a little off balanced. The team was committing turnovers that each player wanted to take back.
Coach Long wanted them back as well.
The Comets switched to a defense in the third quarter to try and confuse the Mountaineers. It worked for a while as the defense denied the Mountaineers. Until the fourth quarter.
Like both teams predicted after the first half, the game was a close one. Tied neck and neck, both teams fought to spring ahead to assure a win. Not until late in the fourth quarter did the Mountaineers start to pull ahead.
The Comets were down by five with two minutes left as Hannah Willet was wide open for a three. Swoosh.
Cutting the lead down to two, the Comets defense physically “stole” the game from Ephrata, forcing turnovers late in the fourth quarter. The Mountaineers couldn’t maintain the lead as the Comets went ahead by two with a couple seconds left.
Ephrata had a chance to end the game with a three-point shot put up, but it fell short.
The next game for the Penn Manor girls is at 8 p.m. and falls on December 23 at Lebanon. Lebanon is (1-1) on the season defeating Penn Manor’s rival, the Hempfield Black Knights on Monday.
The Comets won their first game Monday and plan on repeating against a tough non-league game.
Penn Manor swimmers stepped up to the starting blocks with confidence Monday, knowing that they would probably be able to dominate their opponents from Manheim Central.
Monday night at 6 p.m. Penn Manor went into the meet with the mindset that they had a good chance, but they needed to swim every race the hardest they could. The final score for the girls was 107-63 and 112-53 for the boys, in Penn Manor’s favor.
The boys started off strong, making the score 10-2 only after the first event.
Penn Manor swimmers beat Manheiem Central in their second meet of the 2010-11 season. Photo credit Liz Lawrence.
Good thing for the announcers who periodically report the score over the loud speaker because swimming is a fast paced sport and during a close meet, it’s hard to tell what team is on top.
The scoring for an individual event is six points for first place, four for second place, three for third, two for fourth and one for fifth. But losing the race doesn’t help the team at all.
“I tell the freshman ‘just don’t get last,'” said head coach Cece O’Day.
In relays, only first, second and third place score points for the team. First place gets eight points, second place gets four and there are two points awarded for third.
At the break, the boys were up by 22 points and the girls had a small lead of eight points.
Both Cooper Lindsley and Steven Armstrong have yet to lose a race this year. Lindsley, 8-0, and Armstrong, 7-0, have asked their coach not to make them swim against each other so they wouldn’t break each other’s undefeated winning streak.
Head coach CeCe ODay congratulating Cooper Lindsley on getting first place. Photo credit Liz Lawrence.
The girls were not on top the entire meet, but luckily Jess Burkhart, Jenna Reel and Lauren Longenecker got first, second and third, respectively in the 50 freestyle, right before the break when the score was announced.
After the break, again the same girls repeated their one, two, three placings in the 100 freestyle.
Joelle Williamson did extremely well in the meet and scored a lot of points for the team. She gave the team 24 points, winning the 200 individual medley, the 100 backstroke and the 400 freestyle relay, with Reel, Longenecker and Burkhart. She also helped the team get second place in the medley relay, giving her relay a lead as she got ahead swimming backstroke.
The boys ended the meet strongly, winning first and second in the 400 freestyle relay. Armstrong, Brian Dunne, Trevor Byrne and Travis Wells took first place with a time of 4:03.49, and Eric Bear, Nick Hartley, Sam Spearing and Edward Gahring came in soon after them with a 4:44.38.
Some have said that it’s the beginning of a cyber war. Others have simply called it Wikileaks.
The events surrounding Wikileaks and the media circus that followed have captured the attention of the world.
So much information and misinformation has been bandied around that it’s difficult to find the truth of the matter hidden in the hoopla.
“The government is just trying to control what information is getting out,” said a Penn Manor student, “I don’t think that this should be such a big deal that people are making it out to be.”
Wikileaks is a organization dedicated to keeping governments transparent. Image courtesy of Wikileaks.However, many students had no idea what the word “Wikileaks” even meant, “What’s a Wikileak?” asked one, “Is that a part of Wikipedia?”
First, let’s start at the beginning. Wikileaks was founded in 2006 by Julian Assange and stated it’s reason for being: to leak any and all abuses in power in government, including torture, unlawful detention, cults, corruption, and corporate transparency. Since then, it broke stories on gag orders in the press and massacres of civilians.
Assange, 39, was born in Australia. He began hacking at 16 and was a recreational hacker. After serving time in jail for breaking into a website, he was released on good behavior. It appeared that he had simply broken the website in question just because he could.
But that was 20 years ago. Assange no longer identifies himself as a hacker.
Wikileaks was the site which released the climate scientist’s emails showing how some of the scientists had falsified data to make the climate change argument seem more pronounced than it was.
In 2010, they began to release some of the 250,000 documents collected from United States diplomatic cables. Nine hundred of these documents were published in different world news sources before in collaboration with news outlets, but now the full set is available for users to download. Many of these documents were labeled classified or secret.
“He’s heroic,” said Penn Manor student Alex Mercer, “I think this is awesome.”
Alex Mercer, along with Vaughn Stetler, has studied Wikieaks in their English class.
Assange was arrested in Great Britain recently when he walked into a police station after a warrant was released for his arrest in Sweden, where he is wanted on sexual molestation charges.
Initially, the authorities did not want to pursue his case, as the sex was consensual and the two women affected were only seeking compensation (he had sex with both of the women, but the condom was either not used or broke – which in Sweden can be considered a sexual offense). But after the cables were released, then he was suddenly an international fugitive.
The diplomatic cables were often embarrassing to the United States government, some with diplomats questioning world leaders’ right to rule. Naturally, politicians wanted Assange’s head.
The effect of the documents? Sarah Palin called for Julian Assange to be hanged for treason, although Assange is an Australian. She has been quoted saying, “He’s no journalist – he’s an anti-American operative with blood on his hands.
Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks.
“I think the man is a high tech terrorist. He’s done an enormous damage to our country, and I think he needs to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” said GOP Minority leader Mitch McConnell, “And if that becomes a problem, we need to change that law.”
Assange is not, by most strict definitions, a terrorist, since a terrorist is someone who seeks to inspire fear and terror into the populace. Assange has stated numerous times that the goal of Wikileaks is to provide a transparent insight into government.
The leaks also have been said to endanger troop safety. The newest cables were from February this year. Many of them date from as early as December 1966.
“It’s a national security risk,” said student Vaughn Stetler, “I have nothing wrong with Assange himself, but his website should be shut down. Some clarity is good in government, but leaking secret documents isn’t good.”
The military has now banned using thumb drives, CDs, and DVDs on the Department of Defense’s network, SIPRNET – which stands for Secret Internet Protocol Router Network. The penalty for violating this order? Court martial.
The military is pursuing the prosecution of army corporal Bradly Manning, who is the man taking the blame for leaking the documents. Manning downloaded the documents onto a recordable CD, and gave them to Wikileaks.
Lady Gaga had a role to play, too. According to MSNBC, Manning also “listened and lip-synced to Lady Gaga’s “Telephone” while exfiltrating possibly the largest data spillage in american (sic) history.”
There is at least one irony in the situation: the federal government just released a press statement announcing the 2011 World Press Freedom Day.
Another thing is that Wikileaks is a media outlet, whether cable news likes it or not. The message that seems to be sent out to other world leaders is that this is how the United States deals with journalists sending out things that they do not agree with.
Early in November, the cyber war began.
First, Wikileaks was bombarded with a series of attacks against it’s website, taking the official wikileaks.org site down within days. It struggled to survive, until finally going to its mirror sites. Wikileaks has over 1300 identical sites listed on its website, each one based in different locations around the globe.
The site refused to die. Then Pay Pal pulled its services from the website. That was the last straw for the internet hackers.
On Wednesday, December 8 the credit card provider Visa’s website went down under a flurry of Direct Denial of Service – or DDoS – attacks. DDoS attacks are relatively simple; send small packets of data to the website in question. With enough computers doing this, it will overload the computer’s ability to process all the data and will shut down the site.
The Guy Fawkes mask, made popular by the movie V for Vendetta, is the official uniform of Anonymous.
Eight hours earlier, Mastercard had fallen. The culprits? The internet collective Anonymous.
Anonymous has been reported by major news media as many things from internet vigilantes to a group of sinister hackers. The truth is that they are none and all of these.
Anonymous is said to have originated on the image board 4chan, where a user can post anonymously. With that kind of freedom, anything and everything can be posted. That means the 4chan is a breeding ground for memes (cultural trends spread from the internet). Over 9000? That came from 4chan, along with Leroy Jenkins, the phrase Om Nom Nom and LOLcats.
Anonymous sprung from this, when many users came together with a common goal – to take down the Church of Scientology. In what is called Project Chanology, Anon has promised to destroy Scientology and discredit all of their members. The mission to “save the internet” is called Operation Payback or CableGate. They have so far succeeded several times in knocking down the Church’s website.
Anon has been known to hack into people’s accounts and post online, just for fun. They flood online children’s games and post intentionally offensive messages in a practice known as trolling. They also believe that the internet is an almost sacred place and to violate free speech by jailing Assange is grounds to fight back. A common misconception about them is that there is a leader, which is false. The fact that the collective consciousness of the web can work single mindfully toward a common goal might be cause for enemies of Wikileaks to start getting nervous.
“We are the clear logic used to unveil wrongdoing. The general public, clouded by misleading information mostly by the media with a political agenda, fails to see and understand this wrongdoing. Because of this, those who do the wrongdoing escape unpunished. Anonymous is here to ensure punishment does not go unserved to those who deserve it,” said a supporter of Anon in a Wired.com article.
Senior Ben Clark has followed the events around Wikileaks closely.
“Anonymous is great,” said senior Ben Clark, “I wholly support Assange.”
Over the weekend, several identical flash animation websites popped up over the web – each one containing a button and a slider. All a user had to do was select the number of requests per second, and press the button. The program would then use the user’s browser to make request after request per second – DDoS made easy.
Twitter and the social network Facebook have deleted several accounts that have said that they either support Anonymous or post the dates of the attack and the sites to be attacked. The organizing websites that directed traffic were hit repeatedly by DDoS attacks.
Several members of Anonymous have been arrested in conjunction with the DDoS attacks. DDoS is illegal in the United States.
Wikileaks continues to exist on one of its 1300 mirror sites, as the original site has long ago been wiped from the servers of the Internet by self labeled “patriotic hackers.”
After a week long barrage of attacks, Anonymous has a new strategy: instead of trying to take down those who are hurting Wikileaks, now they will attempt to spread the posts far and wide. These include posting videos to Youtube with misleading tags like “Bieber” or “Tea Party,” and sifting through the documents and posting summaries of the content online.
Operation: Payback is now Operation: Leakspin.
Visa was down for most of last Wednesday. Image courtesy Visa Inc.
They might have a good strategy. During the time Wikileaks was offline, it was incredibly difficult for a user to access the documents and decide for themselves whether or not it was such a big deal. Now with the documents being distributed through the 1300 mirror sites, and the help of Anonymous, it might become very easy indeed to view the documents.
On December 14th, a British judge released Assange on bail until his hearing. He still maintained that he is right in releasing the United States documents. The guidelines of his bail are strict. He has to live in his London home until his hearing, in a sort of modified house arrest.
“My convictions are unfaltering. I remain true to the ideals I have expressed. This circumstance shall not shake them,” said Assange.
“The fact that everyone is making such a huge deal out of this is very silly,” said Clark, “The documents basically embarrassed the government, and that’s it.”
“He’s lucky,” said Mercer, “He isn’t under house arrest, he’s under mansion arrest.”
He also made known his disdain for the companies who have made moves to cut him off from funding, “We now know that Visa, Mastercard, Paypal and others are instruments of U.S. foreign policy. It’s not something we knew before.”
The story of Wikileaks, whether or not it turns out to decide the fate of free speech or the web, will be one that will continue to fascinate and intrigue.
The Penn Manor girls soccer team has received their eighth straight NSCAA All-American Team Academic Award, one of only 242 high schools in the nation to achieve this outstanding honor.
The girls varsity soccer team maintained a 3.76 GPA last year. For the team to be considered for the award, members of the team must have a 3.25 or higher grade point average among them. With a GPA of 3.76, the Penn Manor girls ranked number one public school team in our league and one of the top public schools in the state.
“My academics come first,” said senior Emmy Hess. “Because without academics you can’t be on the field.”
Senior Katie Brenneman is on the team who won the NSCAA All-American Academic Award.
We didn’t find the little green men. We made them.
NASA had scheduled a press conference recently, with a panel of scientists with specialties in exobiology and weird life forms. This garnered high expectations from science buffs, and even some of the general public had to get excited. This was, indeed, a big deal.
Now, that cat’s out of the bag. Revealed was the news that researchers had created a bacteria that was arsenic based, scraped from the bottom on California’s Mono Lake and fed a diet of the poisonous arsenic.
“Bacteria that live on arsenic? Awesome,” said one student.
This announcement was met with high enthusiasm from the scientific community – but was a letdown for the people expecting aliens.
The bacteria which were shown to thrive on arsenic. Photo courtesy ScienceJournal.com
Here’s the how behind the science: Every living thing, from the tiniest protozoa to the giant blue whale, has DNA. DNA, or Deoxyribonucleic Acid, contains the instructions for all of the body’s functions, and is the reason that organisms, including humans, survive. The shape of DNA looks like a twisted ladder. The rungs are made of amino acids, and the sides of the ladder are made of phosphorus bonded to some sugars.
Generally it’s accepted that life has some basic building blocks: carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur, hydrogen, and phosphorus. When scientists look for planets that might be able to evolve alien life, that’s what they look for.
What did the scientists do? They scraped the bottom of Mono Lake for the bacteria GFAJ-1, and started to wean it off it’s diet of phosphorus – and then replace it with arsenic. Arsenic is an element known to be toxic to life, even though it’s right below phosphorus in the periodic table. So you wouldn’t expect it to work, right? Wrong. Not only did the bacteria thrive under the arsenic diet, their DNA became altered to incorporate it. The arsenic replaced some of the phosphorus in the sides of the DNA ladder.
The bacteria were also fed a glucose mixture to use synthesize as ATP – or energy. There was some phosphorus present, but the paper published by the researchers has stated that it wouldn’t have been enough for the bacteria to survive off of.
That means that these little guys are arsenic based.
“There’s this sense of surprise – it’s so unusual that it could change the way we think of everything,” scientist (and science guy) Bill Nye said in a MSNBC television segment, “See, one of the big ideas these days in astrobiology that there could have been what people like to call a second genesis…maybe life arose in multiple ways here on earth, and we’ve never gone looking in the right places and asking the right questions to discover them.”
Oh, if only Arthur C. Clarke was still alive to see this. Clarke, author of 2001: A Space Odyssey (look it up, kids – it’s a sci-fi classic) envisioned life of Saturn’s moons might be silicon based, living in the seas of Europa and in the clouds of the great planet itself.
The real excitement of all this isn’t the bacteria themselves, but of the implications for life on other planets. Up until now, when scientists looked for planets that could support life, they examine whether or not those key elements could exist on the planet. Now we may have to reexamine our viewpoints of what life really is.
Before now, we had always assumed that life needed these key elements to survive. We were wrong.
Mono Lake, California - the home of the Arsenic bacteria.
But why should we care?
“So what?” said another student.
This discovery changes everything in the way we look for life, and how we think of life. This might cause scientists to think just a little bit harder at what they consider “alive”. There are characteristics that life has to have, according to the definition of life. Most of them are standard, like the organism needs to eat and give off waste, and needs to grow – but the key to life is that it had the essential elements, including phosphorus. Now we need to re examine what life is, and change where we look for those “little green men”.
That is, if the results are legitimate.
This announcement has also met some criticism from the scientific community, however. NASA has been accused of putting big hype on a not so big achievement, to get more funding for their programs. Several scientists also question the conclusions that the researchers made about the results obtained – including the claim that the arsenic was present, but not replacing the phosphorus.
Bacteria had been known before to be able to survive in extreme conditions, and there are some bacteria that can live in high arsenic environments.
“I don’t know whether the authors are just bad scientists or whether they’re unscrupulously pushing NASA’s ‘There’s life in outer space!’ agenda,” wrote University of British Columbia Prof. Rosie Redfield, “Basically, it doesn’t present any convincing evidence that arsenic has been incorporated into DNA (or any other biological molecule).”
Redfield critiqued the paper in a blog post that caused some to question the legitimacy of the findings, causing a major debate about the techniques used in the study. The researchers, meanwhile, maintain that their findings and their techniques were valid and precise.
