Discovery on Callisto
Today, while out exploring, my team of researchers and I have found the most extraordinary thing we’ve seen since landing on this moon: life.
Archaebacteria thrive in harsh habitats on Earth, most of them so extreme that it’s hard to believe that any life could ever exist there. They exist in places such as volcanoes, sulfur pools, frozen ice caps in the Arctic, and other harsh and what seems unlivable habitats on Earth. But that’s just the thing, while this bacteria has been found in harsh climates, they’re only found on Earth. Until now.
My team of researchers and I were uncovering the icy ocean hidden underneath the surface of Callisto when we came across this amazing discovery. We decided to measure the salinity levels in the ice, so we took it back to base camp to melt it and study it; to see what was different between the water here and the water on Earth. Upon our various tests, we managed to find that archaebacteria somehow thrived in the frozen world underneath the surface of Callisto. After researching this discovery, we realized that it is quite possible for a bacteria to survive here. There’s water, which actually serves as the bacteria’s habitat. Callisto also has low radiation levels as well, and is not affected by tidal heating since it is so far away from the other moons. This archaebacteria was an unbelievable discovery, and it helped to propel us a little further in our research, since it proved that life could exist on this moon.
After researching further, we’ve realized how Callisto was the first entity in the solar system to be found harboring life, besides Earth. Believe it or not, it was through the craters. Scientists have not only found frozen ice on multiple moons and a planet, but they have also uncovered amino acids in some meteorites. Amino acids are the basic building blocks of life; they make up chromosomes. Scientists were searching for years to see if these two basic elements could combine to form life. And we somehow stumbled upon what they were waiting for all those years.
Callisto is a very, very cratered moon. Most scientists agree that Callisto is the most cratered entity in our solar system. So, that would explain why a meteorite with amino acids possibly hit Callisto’s surface, and the amino acids reacted with the water underneath the surface to form an archaebacteria. Scientists believe that archaebacteria were the first life forms discovered on Earth. They survived through the harsh climes of Earth with it was all lava and volcanoes. In fact, they still live there. So if any life form could be found on a distant moon or planet, it would be an archaebacteria, who could survive the drastic heat or cold.
