NASA Releases Astrobiological Discovery
December 2nd, 2010 |NASA released a breakthrough astrobiological finding Thursday. NASA scientists have discovered animals made with arsenic rather than phosphorus, the fundamental building block of all known life. Arsenic, a metal, is structurally similar to phosphorus, a non-metal. Because of this, arsenic is deadly to phosphorus-based animals since their bodies incorrectly identify it as phosphorus and attempt to bond with it.
Found primarily on Rhea, a moon of Saturn, astrobiologists have identified over 900,000 species, ranging from small ant-like organisms to, “well, primates, if you will,” explains Shannon O’Keefe, NASA’s top astrobiology researcher and professor emeritus at Christopher Columbus University. O’Keefe went on to explain that high resolution photographs taken during fly-bys by NASA’s New Horizons deep space probe were the primary source for the new findings.

- Rhea “Primate”
“We are planning a mission to attempt to interact or even communicate with the new species. Everything is moving very quickly. It’s very exciting,” O’Keefe went on, “We think the quickest way is to send a new space probe containing written and recorded information and also a radio transponder so that, if or when these new species have the intelligence to communicate, they will be able to do so.” O’Keefe would not comment on rumors that President Obama had ordered the 1970s era Pioneer design be used to save money, but she did answer, “Yes, we already spent the money and would like some return,” to the question of whether the space probe would include the Pioneer Plaque pictured below (NSFW version here).

- Pioneer Plaque Censored
Check back for updates on this rapidly developing story.

