What’s Wrong with NASA: Evidences of Life on Saturn’s Moon Enceladus?

By J.P. Skipper

Water jets( http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA11688)

This is my first report for what I suspect will be a landmark year 2012 in this field. Remember that by the end of this year (December) the old is suppose to come to an end and something new begins for Earth, at least as far as the ancient Mayan calendar and various prophets with decent track records are concerned. I can’t say for sure on that but during the meantime, just in case I’m going to get a little more speculative in some of my reporting where I think it is appropriate and it starts with this report.

The above 1st black and white image was taken by the Cassini spacecraft of the southern region of Saturn’s moon Enceladus that periodically sprays out jets or plumes of heated water that quickly freezes to ice in space as you see it doing here. Enceladus is a moon in Saturn’s rings. The current science thinking is that Saturn’s rings are made up of water ice and rock debris of all different sizes as well as a number of moons and dwarf planets held in orbit by huge Saturn’s tremendous gravity well.

The official thinking is that a comet of water ice plowed into Saturn’s orbit some time in the ancient past and, before busting up completely, it may have impacted one or more of Saturn’s moons and/or asteroids in that ancient time generating the rings full of rock debris and water ice held in orbit by Saturn’s tremendous gravity. Enceladus is only the sixth largest of Saturn’s moons with a diameter of 500 km or 310 miles and only 10% the size of the largest moon Titan.

Despite its smaller size, Enceladus is one of the brightest objects in our sky. The thinking on the reason for that is that Enceladus’ surface appears to be made up of a lot of water ice that is of course white in color and highly reflective in sunlight. It should be noted that this moon is located in the densest part of Saturn’s relatively diffuse “E” ring. There is speculation that Enceladus’ water ice outpouring is responsible for much of the density of the “E” ring. Do remember that piece of information because it will become increasingly more important in this reporting.

Note in the above 1st image that the main water jets or plumes appear to stretch in ragged lines of subtle brightness from the lighted edge areas of Enceladus back into the darker areas of the moon’s surface. This suggests that the strongest sprays do indeed come from fissures or cracks in the surface there in this southern region.

The official text in the NASA Photojournal notes that the above image is a mosaic created from two Cassini raw images. The current science thinking is that these are heated water/ice jets originating from deeper down below Enceladus’ surface spraying through fissures in the surface and then quickly freezing to ice in open space. Sounds reasonable doesn’t it.

Most of these fissures are located in the so called “Tiger Stripes” area at Enceladus’ south polar region. These tiger stripes are nothing more than visible fissures (cracks) and, as you can see, the above jet evidence in the darker area tends to support this theory. Now let’s take a closer look at these water venting fissure or tiger stripe sites in the next two images below.

Tiger stripe fissures in Southern pole( http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA06247)

The above 2nd image is a NASA Photojournal PIA06247 shot taken on 7/14/2005 of a large portion of Enceladus’ south polar region and the tiger stripe features area. The official text says that this image is 1,024 pixels wide and that the image scale is 122 meters or 400 feet per pixel. You do the math if you would like to arrive at the scale.

Meanwhile, please note that despite the wide area view, there are no impact craters in the above scene, only ridges, topography buckling, and fissures. Remember that Enceladus is in Saturn’s rings that might generate a bunch of rock missiles, so this tells us that this terrain is relatively young and fairly recently formed even if it isn’t currently jetting water. That suggests that this terrain is mostly water ice that forms into a self leveling liquid or semi-liquid frozen soil mixed mud and then refreezes back eventually into the newer terrain patterns you see here.

 http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/multimedia/pia11127.html

The above 3rd image is a much closer Cassini PIA11127 shot taken on 10/31/2008 over 3 years later. It provides a closer view of the same type of topography in the south polar or tiger stripe region.

As you can see, this is some seriously rough topography but again no impact craters in it. In theory the largest fissures or canyons you see there are the source of water/ice jets. Remember now that the current prevailing science theory is that deeper underground water periodically heats up due to Saturn’s tremendous gravitational influence and expands upward and spewing out into space via the jets or plumes through these largest fissures where it quickly freezes into ice particles and becomes part of Saturn’s diffuse E-ring.

That science speculation tends to suggest that what we are looking at here in the 3rd image may be at least in part soil and rock geology over a subterranean water base and the largest fissures are the escape valves area for the heated rising water as it takes the path of least resistance upward through the largest deep fissures. Again the above 3rd image tends to support this theory. However, now take a look at next two images below and their newer 2010 evidence?

Waves radiating from many central points suggesting liquid surface( http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=228082)

The above 4th and 5th images are the best of their kind and based on the Cassini raw W00065512 image taken more recently on 9/22/2010 of Saturn’s moon Enceladus’ surface. The 4th image is of the general scene at 100% of the original and the 5th image is of the darker lower left quadrant of the general image blown up 200% of the original. The distance is suppose to be 248,565 km or 154,450 miles from the Cassini spacecraft to Enceladus here but it appears to me to be a whole lot closer than that. Further, there appears to have been some manipulation of this W00065512 image.

For example, the original official raw image strip the above 4th and 5th images are drawn from is physically taller and deeper down than the 4th and 5th images I am showing here. I’ve cropped out that bottom dark area because there is nothing in it to see other than dark blankness. One might think that it’s space but it isn’t, it’s just blank substitution.

Because of that, one might think that the W00065512 image view catches the outer edge of Enceladus but that isn’t the case either. I suspect something may have been there in the closer shot in the bottom area of the strip between Enceladus and the Cassini camera that has been removed by basically removing everything in that bottom area of the strip. In my imaging here I’ve left just a little of this at the bottom of both of the above 4th and 5th images for you to see.

Likewise, note the tiny bright specks in the bottom area of the above blown up 200% 5th image. Those bright specks are important. If you saw these bright specks against a dark space background (and you will see that in other images below) rather than against a small world, you would naturally assume that they are stars but most of them aren’t. The tip off is that all of these kind of “stars” are the same size and light intensity. In the case of the Cassini probe, such specks are for the most part residual empty pixels where something has been removed from the image. The proof is that when the image is blown up and enough contrast is added, a collection of image artifacts clustering around these specks revealing this truth can be seen. Tricky isn’t it.

I’m going to suggest that what we are looking at in the above 4th and 5th images is that rough Enceladus terrain in the 2nd and 3rd images being melted into a self leveling fluid soil nd water slurry mixture and each of those different size spots with apparent wave rings radiating out from the center of each one are bubbles of various sizes formed by heated water below rising to the surface in preparation of the next coming water jet event.

It’s similar to water just beginning to boil in a pot of soil and water mixture otherwise known as mud. Note that the fluid is not pouring out from fissures here but heating up from below and melting the entire surface area. This suggests that there may be no hard land surface here at all, just a water/soil mud like consistency on the surface just beginning in more advanced stages to do its water jet/plume thing shortly as would mud if over heated in a pot.

So we’ve learned something about Enceladus’ geology in that regard thanks to the Cassini imaging. However, let’s get back to those tiny bright specks that are in my opinion where some objects have been digitally extracted from the scene.

Note that they are between us and the Enceladus surface, so they can’t be claimed to be stars in space, although they could be claimed to be reflective rocks or ice masses within Saturn’s rings. If so, then why would someone go to all the trouble and expense to remove evidence that isn’t really anomalous? I suspect and speculate that this actually closer view of the Enceladus surface was included in the official record to record this very important and informative geological jetting event starting to unfold for the scientists. However, in doing so, the closer view also revealed objects on a closer larger scale between Enceladus and the Cassini camera with enough resolution to reveal what they may really be and that it is LIFE.

Objects that someone doesn’t want us or the scientists in general and especially those involved in the Cassini mission to know about. No I’m not talking about space ship objects here, it is actually more incredible than that. What I am talking about is biological life itself. Biological life that can live in space but which often remains within range of these Enceladus jetting events and/or within at least the “E” ring of Saturn and its diffuse E-ring water ice resource.

Life that can gather and retain water ice within itself in the rings both as a resource in supporting organic life and to provide self generated power for that life. Further, it also shares some similarities to the bioluminescence organism life in the deepest darkest part of our Earth oceans where bioluminescence in the intense darkness comes in very handy. An adaptation that it shares for the same reasons in the blackness of space. In other words, where there is a need, life often finds a way.

I suspect it is herding or more appropriately schooling space life that is beginning to congregate above and getting ready to take advantage of the upcoming Enceladus water jet resource event shown just beginning to form in the 4th and 5th images here. Life such as that in the following images.

I suspect the only reason that this W00065512 image made it into the official record is because it is geologically important as to the water jets and because cropping off the bottom of the image did away with views too close of denser and more recognizable concentrations of this life against the Enceladus background and the few objects still left in the image shown could be removed individually without drawing much attention to this obfuscation tactic.

OBJECTS AT REST SOME DISPLAYING BIOLUMINESCENCE(http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=228614)

objects having reversed orientation(http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=228613)

The above 6th and 7th images are two separate Cassini N00164016 and N00164015 raw images, both taken on 10/4/2010, that demonstrates these objects against against a space background. Although they are from two separate images, note that one is closer than the other. Also note that they are both of the same scene but with subtle differences. For example, note that the orientation of the objects is the reverse of each other and there has also been some subtle changes changes in the background.

Please also note that this change in orientation is not the result of a flipping of the image, only a change limited to the object’s and their orientation. All of these factors combine as evidence strongly suggesting that these objects are real and not imaging artifacts of any kind. Now note in this 7th image the closer view all those “stars” in the background. Note how many there are and their general uniformity in size and light intensity quite contrary to natural stars that would be of different sizes and intensity.

Not quite all but most of this evidence is not stars at all but the empty pixels where something has been extracted from the image during processing. Now if that is true, think now many there are of what ever has been removed from this scene. Despite their more distant appearance due to their smaller size, I suspect that these empty pixels represent closer to the camera views of these same objects that might have provided a stronger recognition factor raising the suspicion even among conformity influenced scientists that they may be looking at life here and opening that door in their thinking.

However, there are yet other factors to consider. For example, note the uniformity of size and length of the objects that we can still see here even after the obfuscation work. This level of uniformity is typical of life all deriving from the same genetic code building blocks. At the same time, this is not typical of rock and soil or ice mass geology in Saturn’s rings. For example, it is well known that the rings are made up of particles from the size of mere specks to the size of large homes and larger. That kind of variance is not represented here in these anomalous bright objects.

Water is without a doubt the enabling factor here both in the form of liquid and ice. Consider this, water is a combination of H20. Both hydrogen and oxygen individually or together can be used as sources of power not to mention constituting the body fluids of living tissue. It is within the realm of reason that some life forms originating in a water environment originally could over time evolve and develop into self propelling their way via expenditure of that power in nearby space and through out Saturn’s rings harvesting water ice in the thinner material as they go and those within range returning to these great Enceladus liquid water jetting events cruising through the water plumes to take on larger more satisfying loads.

It is also within reason that such creatures starting out life in water depths without sunlight and in complete darkness under an mud top surface frozen cover would likely develop bioluminescence in order to communicate with others of its kind, find mates, compensate for freezing space conditions, and deal with predators just as we see in the deepest darkest parts of our Earth oceans. As they evolve to live out of the water, they just exchange one form of swimming for another.

http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=228567

The above 8th image is drawn from yet another Cassini N00163969 raw image. I’ve included it here just so that you can see more evidence of the objects against a space only background and to demonstrate that this kind of evidence is typical in the Cassini imaging near Enceladus and within Saturn’s rings. Note once again the objects and their different light producing effect from object to object. Note also the great many “stars” in the background that, if they are life extracted from the scene, may be evidence of immense schools of these creatures and just how numerous they really are in “empty” space.

Image artifacts clustering around specks(http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=228567)

The above 9th image is just a section of the 8th image blown up 400% to demonstrate the “stars” in the background. Although you can also see the dimmer always present noise artifacts in this background, note how the brighter “artifacts” cluster around the “stars” that are actually empty pixels left behind when something was extracted from the image at these many points. Now look back at the 7th, 8th and 9th (below) images and think about how numerous these are. This is what happens when a location in a digital image is disturbed by subsequent spot specific manipulation.

objects-in-flight(http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=227384)

The above 10th image evidence is drawn from yet another Cassini N00163126 raw image. I believe that it demonstrates the objects straightened out and underway all in the same direction like a school of fish. Again, note that some are generating an inner light source and some are not. I believe that objects with a slight curve to them represents objects generally at rest even though they may or may not be completely stopped.

I suspect that objects straightened out as you see above indicates exerting power and underway. This factor implies that these objects are likely organic in their composition so typical of life. It also implies that they can change their shape to some extent.

objects-in-jet(http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA07759)

The above final 11th image is a scene taken of Enceladus during a water jet event backlit by the Sun. It demonstrates a couple of things. First, it demonstrates the full extent of expansion into space of the water geyser event from the south polar region not adequately shown by the raw black and white imaging and just how extensive a deal it really is. Second, it shows the objects pointed out with the yellow arrows. Note that all of these are straightened out and likely underway going through this water plume event tending to back up my own speculations.

I know that all of this is a lot for some of you to take in including even some of you with more open minds. After all, how can something alive exist in the emptiness even vacuum of space?

The fact is that I first brought this possibility to you attention in my 2009 Report #170 because of the visual evidence. If this is truly life, then its behavior suggests an aquatic schooling origin like schooling fish and Enceladus may even be its ancestral home. Some of the visual evidence suggests even more complexity in that this life may be a cooperative schooling form that can also join with others of its kind cooperatively and change its over all visual appearance in the process.

Life in space, despite the human preconception against it, is not a new way out idea. For example, there is NASA’s own STS-75 The Tether incident where an electro dynamic tether to generate power in space experiment was deployed in space where nothing by conventional thinking should be able to live. Yet the tether broke off via an unexpected power surge and still producing power began to be surrounded by swarming “some things” that clearly appeared to be disc shaped living objects.

You could tell that the astronauts were stunned and initially at a loss for words just watching the swarming. When mission ground control broke in and asked what these things were, the reporting astronaut tried to pass it off as debris coming off of the spacecraft even though these large objects were at least 77 miles away and in movement behind the tether from the spacecraft camera. In other words, the objects were likely bigger than the spacecraft itself and could not possibly be “debris.”

In my opinion, the only thing that is hard to believe about this incident is the completely foolish human explanation with more obvious holes in it than a big hunk of swiss cheese. If the tether principle was really abandoned by NASA, it is more likely because its radiating power attracted too many life forms feeding on that power with unknown consequences.

Some and especially the most innocent scientists will no doubt scoff at this as the most ridiculous kind of speculation pointing out that the great majority of the science communities would love to make scientific history by discovering life on other worlds including even in space and that there is no chance that they would deny it to public consumption. Further, I would even agree with most of that in general.

However, what they are failing in their naivety to take into consideration is that space, UFOs, and alien research and exploration is also big business here on Earth building vast fortunes empowering those that have ascended to oligarchy world control status. They police their own and to fall from such exalted heights is too much of a horror for them to contemplate. Most in government and science are but mere employees of oligarchy choosing. Worse, they own all the most important communication pathways like the major media and they in a round about way control most of the military including military and civilian intelligence communities.

For example, if someone under their influence (and who isn’t) gets hold of an alien craft as crap happens for aliens just as it does for us. The technological gains that are its potential equates directly to world wide military advantage, money, and power. The same if someone under their influence gets hold of an alien or aliens or just negotiates in secret with them. For them, it’s all about wealth, power, and control and everything to that end is expedient.

As they see it, the double edge of the sword is that on one edge aliens and their advanced technology exists with its power potential drawing them with their focus on self like mindless flies to honey. Yet, on the other edge, is the potential for interference from populations that tend to be more idealistic and want to argue about right and wrong for all concerned. What the science community doesn’t seem to understand is that idealism and altruism are regarded by oligarchy as completely unrealistic and foolish and a waste of their time.

What the oligarchy knows is that admitting to any kind of life beyond the confines of Earth or for that matter intelligent alien life here on Earth, leads to an opening of the mind and what it will consider next. It’s like you can’t be just a little bit pregnant, you either are or you aren’t. Right now denial among populations and the science communities is the norm and the oligarchy has worked long and hard at considerable expense to create this prevalent social condition. They don’t want to abandon it because it will ultimately mean interference with what they do within the protection of secrecy as too many others not under their control start to become involved.

Yet, the very technology advantage that has been such a primary mover in making them, is also undermining them. As greater and greater communication among populations advances, the secrecy that shields the oligarchy is also undermined and is looking at collapse. Their own AI super computer modeling, assuming they are feeding it objective material, without a doubt predicts this. We out here in the populations are right on the cusp of this happening in our time.

So Mr. scientist they are running scared and they will try to prevent as long as possible that knowledge door from opening within you and you beginning to wake up. Meanwhile they are trying to figure out a way to survive what is coming and preserve their exalted positions of power. So they keep you and your work confined and compartmentalized so that you can’t see the true big picture. For the few that this doesn’t work on, they create a false big picture for you to focus on while the real picture remains solely out of your sight and within their control.

The bottom line is that their proven success formula historically requires secrecy as well as your and our ignorance. Unless they can develop a different successful formula that they can be willing to try in their self isolation, they can’t afford for you or I to wake up and open the door to idealistic interference problems for them. The trouble from their point of view is that the admission of water in what we would consider normal conditions on the surface of a world leads to the consideration of biological life on that surface and that in turn of course leads to the consideration of intelligent and even advanced life and of course we aren’t ignorant and in their control any more.

I know that many of you on all sides don’t want to face this but we’re now long past the point of no return and it’s too late to clamp down or turn back the tide now. The collapse of most of this particular brand of secrecy on our world is immanent and the general science and population ignorance so long entrenched is going to fall away with it. The level of technological advancement guarantees it. The key is to adapt now or suffer the consequences.

Joseph P. Skipper

Ancient Atlantis or Something Else?

By J. P. Skipper

The report is about an Earth based scenario, a combination of the possibilities inherent in a background Earth story, some possible hypotheses by me, and then some visual evidence to add into the mix. It will be up to you to decide if there is any merit. First we’ll start with the background story.

In more modern times, the story of ancient Atlantis has fascinated generations and some to obsession as a real place. As many of you may know, it is acknowledged that the story of Atlantis was first introduced into public awareness via dialogues by the Greek philosopher Plato around 355–360 BC. As the story goes, Plato’s references regarding Atlantis was allegedly in turn sourced from a 500 hundred years earlier 6th century BC trip by the Athenian lawgiver Solon to Egypt where an Egyptian priest there translated a part of an unknown history of ancient Athens and Atlantis from papyri scrolls of Egyptian hieroglyphs to Greek of a time some 9,000 year earlier to that 6th century period.

According to the translation, it seems that the god/man Poseidon (you know, Zeus, Hera, Apollo etc.) fell in love with a human female named Cleito on the island Atlantis who bore him many sons, the oldest of which was named Atlas. Now it should be noted at this point that the term “Atlantis” in Greek means “island of Atlas” and the term “Atlantic” Ocean was named after Atlas. It seems that in the even more distant past, the “gods” divided up Earth lands among themselves and Poseidon to his liking was assigned the then Atlantis lands west off of the Pillars of Hercules which the latter we know today as the Strait of Gibraltar separating the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea.

So, despite the many other location prospects presented by others as more likely sites, the ancient story clearly places the location of the Atlantean culture in the Atlantic Ocean somewhere west of the Strait of Gibraltar. Many have a problem with this because it is the scientific consensus opinion that this location is geologically impossible. Further, since science now days considers itself rational and enlightened, the story starting off with the “god” Poseidon likely causes many not to take it serious and regard it as little more than fabricated myth.

However, this ignores the ancient Sumarian and Indian culture record as also referring to such “gods” in human form including conducting great wars with each other. The consensus also makes the assumption that such records are not history but merely fabricated myths and legends to explain events they didn’t understand by ancient people less sophisticated and knowledgeable than ourselves. In my opinion, such views reveal more about our flaws and arrogance than ancient ones.

In any case, the story goes on to describe Atlantis as an island or a great number of islands occupying a very large area of specific measurement so that it might also be considered as large as a continent. Therefore do note that it isn’t described so much as a “continent” as we think of single land mass but a collection of land masses with the island Atlantis as its center of power.

The Atlantean’s are described as a naval power that also possessed flying machines. It seems that landmass Atlantis itself was occupied by Atlas and was an island with mountains. One of these mountains where Cleito apparently resided was carved by Poseidon into a great palace with concentric rings of land, walls, and canals extending out from its center and complete with other canal systems. It seems that the eastern most and other reaches of the Atlantean world were separate kingdoms divided up almost certainly among Atlas’s brothers and so the Atlantean world was a confederation of kingdoms with Atlantis as its power center.

In the time some 9,000 years before the time of Solon and the translation, the Atlantean confederation or some portion of it was apparently aggressively attacking and conquering in western Europe, parts of Africa, and attacking into the Mediterranean where they encountered ancient Athens. Athens standing alone stopped them militarily and thus no doubt the reason for Solon’s Greek interest in the Egyptian translated story. At some point in time not too long after this Atlantean military defeat there is suppose to have been some kind of earthquake upheaval that in one day and night caused the whole of the Atlantean world to sink beneath the Atlantic Ocean causing mud to poor in on top of it creating an impassable and unsearchable muddy shoal and a hazard to navigation.

Remember such records in these ancient times were likely one-off laboriously hand inscribed accounts and not a record that is repeated as we do today via books and electronic devices. So if the one record is destroyed, the account is lost forever. So this is a no doubt condensed Egyptian account/record further condensed by Solon, further condensed by Plato, and further condensed and interpreted by people like me in more recent times so that much information and, more important, a true sense of elapsed time is lost and/or distorted. So there may be a tendency to think about this account happening in shorter lengths of condensed time than may have actually been the case.
For example, we now know something about plate tectonics as well as continental drift and we now know, if we thought about it very much, that this identified location out in the Atlantic west of the Pillars of Hercules would be near an ever expanding seam between tectonic plates and a geologically unstable area due to that fact. This suggests the multiple fracture zones of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Logically, over the centuries earthquakes and rising sea levels may have alerted many intelligent advanced Atlantean people to their island life peril and especially among the island kingdoms with lower elevations.

This would have likely caused some Atlanteans, especially in the Atlantean eastern reaches, to be concerned about future sudden flooding caused by earthquakes building in intensity over the years and/or centuries and flooding shorelines. That may have caused them to attempt to shift populations further eastward to the mainland of western Europe and Africa getting into conflict with those already there occupying those places.

Also, before I forget to include this, it should be noted at this point that the Egyptian account clearly identifies a continent further west of Atlantis bounding the Atlantic Ocean that sounds an awful lot like the American continents. This in turn clearly suggests at least an Egyptian familiarity in ancient 6th century BC times and/or before with the western boundaries of the Atlantic Ocean and its navigation. That would make sense with a broad area of islands in the mid Atlantic making island hopping or circumventing navigation westward to the Americas much easier.

There is even the information in the account of the sunken shoals of Atlantis impeding navigation in the Atlantic. Even if the Egyptian account is false and a creation by Plato or his predecessors, it still suggests a navigation knowledge of the Atlantic Ocean to its western boundaries by some Mediterranean people in 355-360 BC and/or before Plato’s time and that too is significant.

Also, here’s another consideration. The underwater terrain area immediately east of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge area has not only many fracture zones demonstrating geological instability but many mountain ranges as well no doubt created over time by that geological instability. Some of the highest mountains stick out of the water and their tops are islands out in the mid Atlantic. It is also likely that the highest mountains would be those created deeper within the Mid-Atlantic Ridge fracture zone areas.

Now consider that the events described here allegedly happened roughly about 12,000 years back into the past from the present time. Today our science tells us that the last glacial maximum (coldest period) peaked about 20,000 years ago and ended about 10,000 years ago as we entered the current interglacial cycle warming period. That means that 12,000 year ago from our time the Atlantean culture would be facing a warming trend that would have been ongoing and well along for some 8,000 years with melting ice sheets and sea levels rising nearing to the completion of this warming cycle just 2,000 years in their future.

Think about it. Depending on its possible age of existence, the Atlantean culture may have been initially established at some period during the last ice age glacial maximum around 20,000 years ago. During that earlier time, the ice sheets would likely have been at their peaks of mass and the sea level would have been at its lowest. That means that a great deal of the top of those mountain ranges east of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge plate tectonic seam would have likely been sticking considerably out of the water forming a massive area of islands with many of them land interconnected and suitable for habitation.

This has all kinds of negative implications for any civilization based on the mountain range islands in the mid Atlantic during an 8,000 year long to that date interglacial warming/melt trend and its geological changes. As their island centers were threatened by rising water levels and increasingly made more and more vulnerable to the occasional earthquake driven tsunamis and other rogue waves from deeper water over the centuries, there would have logically been a migration from this home area by many while others stayed behind unwilling to leave so typical of human behavior.

This would explain the view of Atlanteans moving east by Egyptian and Greeks as invaders. Did you know that Egyptian earliest history includes accounts of battles fought with unidentified peoples from the west? The Atlanteans on the move, but being a finite number of people without the replenishment reserves of an long term established people and even with more advanced technology, they would gradually have been worn down in conquering ability pushing east into western Europe and Africa until finally exhausted they met their match and perhaps were stopped by the Athenians and a growing culture that later produced the fiercely committed Spartan defenders at Thermopylae. If so, now all that is left of their legacy is perhaps some of their DNA in many of us and some long lasting megalithic structure evidence in Europe and Africa as their smaller numbers were eventually absorbed into the greater human whole of that part of the world.

This is the Earth Atlantis story in basic and some of my thoughts on it. You will notice that I do not label this information as so many others do as myth. From my point of view, it is neither myth nor truth but simply a story like that of Troy that may have some basis for fact in it and not to be summarily dismissed. In other words, I suspect there is core truth to be had somewhere in this story.

You can perhaps understand that, when I got Google Earth, one of the first things I did was go looking for any sign of civilization underwater in the Atlantic west off of the Pillars of Hercules where the Atlantean culture at its height is alleged to be located. I expected nothing and especially not in light of the fact that so much of the satellite imaging has been obfuscated. However, I did find what clearly appears to be some evidence of artificial construction underwater west southwest well out from the Strait of Gibraltar.

I was going to report on it before now but got distracted into planetary evidence and kept putting it off until now. I also delayed because I wanted to further inspect what appears to be some underwater canal systems joining certain islands still sticking out of the water in the general area. However, recently I received an email bringing this site back to my attention from a Clinical Psychologist Dr. Christof Lehmann wanting to know what I thought of the same underwater formations? I’m glad he did. Now let’s look at some Google imaging showing the location of the site and the site itself.

The above 1st image is a context view showing the Atlantic Ocean, the position of the unstable Mid-Atlantic Ridge tectonic plate fracture zone and the rough mountainous underwater terrain produced by it. Likewise, the red arrow demonstrates the underwater evidence site to the left relative to the Strait of Gibraltar or Pillars of Hercules to the right at the mouth of the Mediterranean. As you can see, the placement of the site is in general consistent with the ancient story of the placement of the Atlantean empire.

The above 2nd image from Google Earth provides a closer but still context view showing a little more detail of the evidence that surrounds the site. Note that the site in question appears to be underwater on the east edge of the rough mountainous Mid Atlantic Ridge terrain and on the west edge of a more level plain. However, one needs to be cautious. This may or may not be accurate as a portion of the smoother plain appearance may also be the result of smudge treatments applied to the local area. In fact, if one takes into consideration image tampering treatments, what we can see of the underwater ruins may merely be only part of a greater whole hidden by smudge treatments.

The above 3rd and 4th images provide different types of views of the underwater ruins site. As you can see these many geometric right angle and linear lines are almost certainly represent artificially created ruins of some kind. However, note that there are apparently no concentric round rings as the story describes that are suppose to be on the main island of Atlantis. Further, while there are other long linear lines east of this site that could be old ancient canals connecting islands, there is no more evidence of ruins this definitive in the immediate surroundings.

Does this tell us that this isn’t Atlantis? Not hardly. The ruin outlines you see above are also how this site would look if smudge image tampering were a factor. Same with the extensive smooth plain to the east of this site. You can take nothing for granted in this regard as to what role image tampering may play by hiding evidence.

So does this tell us that this is Atlantis? Again the answer is no. However, what it does tell us is that what we have here is artificial ruin outlines underwater on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean where none should exist and that alone is very significant. Scientists tell us that this is impossible but here you have the visual evidence. Unless some advanced aliens built something here underwater that has been covered over by smudge treatments and still printing through them, we’re almost certainly looking at ancient human civilization construction evidence that had to have been created by ancients over time and unquestionably out of water. That means that this site existed at one time in the past out of water and on dry land.

That in turn logically means that this civilization evidence may have existed active at some time during the last glacial cold period as much as 20,000 years ago when the ice sheets were at their maximum and the water level here was much lower than now exposing these lands to air and sunlight. That in turn makes the story of some ancient civilization like the Atlantean culture in the Atlantic Ocean off of the Pillars of Hercules more feasible.

For example, the destruction of Atlantis, if the overnight time frame is legitimate and not a result of condensing the time line in the Egyptian reporting the event, may have been the result of a combination of things building up over centuries. Rising water during the interglacial warming trend would be the chief suspect but would not alone sufficiently explain the overnight disaster scenario. On the other hand, warming trend rising water levels would have made islands more vulnerable to inundation at the same time that increasing downward weight pressure of the rising water on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge geologically unstable area could have created a subterranean collapse of the plate dropping down a bit and/or a significant earthquake displacing and pushing water in a great wave over the already vulnerable island culture depositing swirling stirred up bottom sediment (mud) over the area.

The above evidence site may or may not be part of an Atlantean empire. However, it was a part of something out here in this now underwater terrain and there is no telling what extensive civilization evidence may be hidden in this area under smudge treatments. If there is anyone out there around the world with access to commercial satellite imaging of this underwater general area that may not have been subjected to tampering treatments, please get it to me for examination and we’ll see if there is anything more to be seen here!

Now that the above evidence leans so much in favor of artificial civilization evidence being possible underwater in this general area of the Atlantic Ocean, is there is further evidence of the civilization kind on this side of the Atlantic? As it turns out, there actually is north of this area and off the west coast of Ireland and the visual evidence is as follows.

The above 5th image is the wide angle context view of that evidence both out on the coastal shallower water shelf represented by the lighter blue color and down in a deeper canyon system represented by the darker blue color. Note that this evidence is not really like the ruins of buildings because the imprint of it is finer and closer textured but still with the sharp 90º right angle boundary geometry and long straight linear lines so typical of man’s constructions.

In the above 6th image, note the lower section pointed out between the two arrows. This looks suspiciously like writing of some unknown kind, at least to me. IF this is writing, perhaps some better forensic imaging experts in conjunction with some linguist experts probably in ancient text could get better details and interpret this?

To that end, the above 7th image provides a closer view of this possible writing. It also provides a good view of how precise the southern straight line boundary of this grid like site makes a perfect sharp 90º turn upward north forming the west boundary edge of the entire site. As you can see, the corner is just too right angle perfect to be the result of some natural occurrence and has been almost certainly implemented by artificial means. As with the previous evidence, the presence of smudge and/or a mud covering on the site tells us that these are not imaging artifacts but something actually present on the bottom.

The above 8th image view is of the top or north and west boundary of the site off of Ireland. As you can see, this area of the site is more compromised by blur. That is caused I suspect mostly by obscuring smudge treatments but acknowledge that it could be mud as well. However, even so, note there are many objects (containers ?) of the same size and in a side-by-side east/west orientation repeating in a long uniformly even line here mostly but not completely obscured and as pointed out by the red arrows.

It obviously suggests artificiality rather than something of natural origin. What any explorer worth his salt wouldn’t give to go down and inspect that long line of same size objects seen in the above 8th image!

What this site is exactly I cannot say. Could it be a giant horizontal read message board with all the main smaller text obscured and only the grossly large bottom line of text printing through the obscuring mud and/or smudge? What ever it is, the main thing is that it appears to be of artificial origin and it is underwater in the Atlantic off the west coast of Ireland. It is entirely possible that this site also dates back into glacial maximum times when the water levels here were at their lowest level exposing this area to the air and sunlight enabling this construction.

The problem with that consideration is that 20,000 years ago during the peak glacial cold cycle, the ice sheets extending down from the Artic north of this point would likely have covered this site making it very difficult for human habitation. Also, the lowered sea levels would have exposed what is now the British Isles including Ireland and the English Channel making this area a landmass extension of the European continent.

If this now underwater site would not be conducive to human habitation back then during the glacial cold cycle, could this site be some kind of giant heated grid type sign system then on exposed land melting ice away from around it and framing a giant message meant only to be seen from above? Perhaps a giant boundary marker defining territory?

In other words, discoveries raising questions like this point to a time in this planet’s history when things were happening that we in our ignorance in this time have little to no knowledge of today except for a few privy to truthful satellite imaging. With that in mind and consistent with human behavior, there may be a tendency to speculate that these things were happening before our recordedhistory? If so, let me say a word about that.

More than likely, there was such a recorded history. For example, the ancient libraries that we know were intentionally sacked and burned a number of times in the lands around the Mediterranean may have contained a great deal of this information. So much of the information in them was destroyed just because of the information they contained that someone of the time didn’t want known. So, with the destruction, the information lost to human civilization is incalculable. I might add that sadly much of that library destruction was undertaken in the name of religion and its intolerance for difference.

I am reminded of the ancient peoples in the opposite direction of South and Central America. They recorded a great deal of history on gold likely thinking that the knowledge would never perish on this wonderfully stable metal. They did not of course anticipate that European white men driven by greed and accompanied by zealot guardians of religion would wish to destroy even history, covet the gold, melt it down wholesale (again knowledge destroyed) too fill great ship convoys headed back to Europe to feed even greater greed and the power addicts of that time.

If very much of any of this ancient information had survived intact, it is possible that humanity would have surged centuries ahead increasingly on an individual basis not nearly as dependent on leaders to manipulate us via spin telling us what to think, how to feel, and what to do that always seems to benefit the few but rarely the many that take the action and run the risks. However, that’s just my personal thoughts.

Addendum added 7/19/2010

It has been brought to my attention by a number of people that this possible site in the Atlantic off of the Pillars of Hercules has been discovered and apparently reported on previously by someone else also making a possible Atlantis connection. I don’t know who. At the same time it seems that Google has put forth an official explanation found HERE that the evidence is a artifact of bathymetric data collection sonar process from boats with the lines reflecting the path of the boats. I was not aware either of the prior discovery or the official explanation at the time of my reporting above.

Because of the location of this particular evidence, it is natural to associate this site with Atlantis. The subject of a technologically advanced human civilization prior to our current recorded history is not welcome in science or political consensus circles just as it was not in ancient times with the destruction of the great libraries. In this time it is preferred to promote surprisingly advanced but still suitably and safely primitive cultures like the Minoans in the Mediterranean as the bases for the story of Atlantis.

As for the official Google explanation, if the Google Earth underwater search function revealed a pattern of sites like this as a result of fuzzy sonar readings around the Earth, such an official explanation might hold a little interest for more investigation. However, no matter what they say, the evidence just isn’t there. That means that the official explanation amounts to no more than a claim and it is clear that this site west off the Pillars of Hercules has been specifically targeted for this special explanation.

The bottom line is that, if they can get the deep rough and very intricate Mid-Atlantic Ridge massive area bottom information west adjacent to this site correct without such visual defects, that says it all and the official explanation is not something to take seriously. You must decide what has merit and what does not for yourself. As for me, I stand by my reporting.

 

Should We Terraform Mars? A Debate

This is a part of a debate organised by NASA. Science Fiction Meets Science Fact. ‘What are the real possibilities, as well as the potential ramifications, of transforming Mars?’ Terraform debaters left to right, Greg Bear , author of such books as “Moving Mars” and “Darwin’s Radio.”; David Grinspoon , planetary scientist at the Southwest Research Institute; James Kasting , geoscientist at Pennsylvania State University; Christopher McKay , planetary scientist at NASA Ames Research Center.; Lisa Pratt , biogeochemist at Indiana University; Kim Stanley Robinson , author of the “Mars Trilogy” (“Red Mars,” “Green Mars” and “Blue Mars“); John Rummel , planetary protection officer for NASA; moderator Donna Shirley , former manager of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Donna Shirley: Greg, what are the ethics of exploring Mars?

Greg Bear: You usually talk about ethics within your own social group. And if you define someone as being outside your social group, they’re also outside your ethical system, and that’s what’s caused so much trauma, as we seem to be unable to recognize people who look an awful lot like us as being human beings.

When we go to Mars, we’re actually dealing with a problem that’s outside the realm of ethics and more in the realm of enlightened self-interest. We have a number of reasons for preserving Mars as it is. If there’s life there, it’s evolved over the last several billion years, it’s got incredible solutions to incredible problems. If we just go there and willy-nilly ramp it up or tamp it down or try to remold it somehow, we’re going to lose that information. So that’s not to our best interest.

We were talking earlier about having a pharmaceutical expedition to Mars, not just that but a chemical expedition to Mars, people coming and looking for solutions to incredible problems that could occur here on Earth and finding them on Mars. That could generate income unforeseen.

If we talk about ethical issues on a larger scale of how are other beings in the universe going to regard how we treat Mars, that’s a question for Arthur C. Clarke to answer, I think. That’s been more his purview: the large, sometimes sympathetic eye staring at us and judging what we do.

We really have to look within our own goals and our own heart here. And that means we have to stick within our social group, which at this point includes the entire planet. If we decide that Mars is, in a sense, a fellow being, that the life on Mars, if we discover them – and I think that we will discover that Mars is alive – is worthy of protection, then we have to deal with our own variations in ethical judgment.

“I’ve heard a lot of people say, ‘Why should we go to Mars, because look at what human beings have done to Earth.'” -David Grinspoon Image Credit: NASA

The question is, if it’s an economic reality that Mars is extraordinarily valuable, will we do what we did in North America and Africa and South America and just go there and wreak havoc? And we have to control our baser interests, which is, as many of us have found out recently, very hard to do in this country. So we have a lot of problems to deal with here, internal problems. Because not everyone will agree on an ethical decision and that’s the real problem with making ethical decisions.

Donna Shirley: David, you want to comment on the ethics of terraforming Mars?

David Grinspoon: Well, one comment I’ve heard about recently, partly in response to the fact that the president has recently proposed new human missions to Mars – of course, that’s not terraforming, but it is human activities on Mars – and I’ve heard a lot of people say, “Why should we go to Mars, because look at what human beings have done to Earth. Look at how badly we’re screwing it up. Look at the human role on Earth. Why should we take our presence and go screw up other places?”

It’s an interesting question, and it causes me to think about the ethics of the human role elsewhere. What are we doing in the solar system, what should we be doing? But, it’s very hard for me to give up on the idea. Maybe because I read too much science fiction when I was a kid, I do have, I have to admit, this utopian view of a long-term human future in space. I think that if we find life on Mars, the ethical question’s going to be much more complicated.

But in my view, I think we’re going to find that Mars does not have life. We may have fossils there. I think it’s the best place in the solar system to find fossils. Of course, I could be wrong about this and I’d love to be wrong about it, and that’s why we need to explore. If the methane observation is borne out, it would be, to me, the first sign that I really have to rethink this, that maybe there is something living there under the ice.

“If the methane observation is borne out, maybe there is something living there under the ice.” -David Grinspoon Image Credit: NASA

But let’s assume for a second that Mars really is dead, and we’ve explored Mars very carefully – and this is not a determination we’ll be able to make without a lot more exploration – but assuming it was, then what about this question. Should human beings go to Mars, because do we deserve to, given what we’ve done to Earth? And to me, the analogy is of a vacant lot versus planting a garden. If Mars is really dead, then to me it’s like a vacant lot, where we have the opportunity to plant a garden. I think, in the long run, that we should.

We’ve heard a lot different possible motivations, economic motivations, or curiosity, but I think ultimately the motivation should be out of love for life, and wanting there to be more life where there’s only death and desolation. And so I think that ethically, in the long run, if we really learn enough to say that Mars is dead, then the ethical imperative is to spread life and bring a dead world to life.

Donna Shirley: Jim, we can’t prove a negative, so how do we know if there’s life or not, if we keep looking and looking and looking. How long should we look? How would we make that decision?

James Kasting: I think Lisa put us on the right track initially. She’s studying subsurface life on Earth. If there’s life on Mars today, it’s subsurface. I think it’s deep subsurface, a kilometer or two down. So I think we do need humans on Mars, because we need them up there building big drilling rigs to drill down kilometers depth and do the type of exploration that Lisa and her group is doing on Earth here. I think that’s going to take not just decades, but probably a couple of centuries before we can really get a good feel for that.

Lake Vostok. Image Credit: NASA

Donna Shirley: Well, I know, John, at Lake Vostok, one of the big issues is, if we drill into it, our dirty drilling rigs are going to contaminate whatever’s down there. So how do we drill without worrying about contaminating something if it is there?

John Rummel: Well, you accept a little contamination probabilistically that you can allow operations and still try to prevent it. I mean, basically what we can do is try to prevent that which we don’t want to have happen. We can’t ever have a guarantee. The easiest way to prevent the contamination of Mars is to stay here in this room. Or someplace close by.

Greg Bear: That’s known as abstinence.

John Rummel: [laughs]. I also want to point out it’s not necessarily the case that the first thing you want to do on Mars, even if there’s no life, is to change it. We don’t know the advantages of the martian environment. It’s a little bit like the people who go to Arizona for their allergies and start planting crabgrass right off. They wonder why they get that. And it may be that Mars as it is has many benefits. I started working here at NASA Ames as a postdoc with Bob McElroy on controlled ecological life-support systems. There’s a lot we can do with martian environments inside before we move out to the environment of Mars and try to mess with it. So I would highly recommend that not only do we do a thorough job with robotic spacecraft on Mars, but we do a thorough job living inside and trying to figure out what kind of a puzzle Mars presents.

The ALH Meteorite. Image Credit: NASA/ Johnson Space Center

Donna Shirley: Stan, you dealt with this issue in your book with the Reds versus the Greens. What are some of the ethics of making decisions about terraforming Mars?

Kim Stanley Robinson: Ah, the Reds versus the Greens. This is a question in environmental ethics that has been completely obscured by this possibility of life on Mars.

After the Viking mission, and for about a decade or so, up to the findings of the ALH meteorite, where suddenly martian bacteria were postulated again, we thought of Mars as being a dead rock. And yet there were still people who were very offended at the idea of us going there and changing it, even though it was nothing but rock. So this was an interesting kind of limit case in environmental ethics, because this sense of what has standing. People of a certain class had standing, then all the people had standing, then the higher mammals had standing – in each case it’s sort of an evolutionary process where, in an ethical sense, more and more parts of life had standing, and need consideration and ethical treatment from us. They aren’t just there to be used.

• See terraforming image gallery and martian topographical renderings

When you get to rock, it seemed to me that there would be very few people (wanting to preserve it). And yet, when I talked about my project, when I was writing it, it was an instinctive thing, that Mars has its own, what environment ethicists would call, “intrinsic worth,” even as a rock. It’s a pretty interesting position. And I had some sympathy for it, because I like rocky places myself. If somebody proposed irrigating and putting forests in Death Valley, I would think of this as a travesty. I have many favorite rockscapes, and a lot of people do.

So, back and forth between Red and Green, and one of the reasons I think that my book was so long was that it was just possible to imagine both sides of this argument for a very long time. And I never really did reconcile it in my own mind except that it seemed to me that Mars offered the solution itself. If you think of Mars as a dead rock and you think it has intrinsic worth, it should not be changed, then you look at the vertical scale of Mars and you think about terraforming, and there’s a 31-kilometer difference between the highest points on Mars and the lowest. I reckoned about 30 percent of the martian surface would stay well above an atmosphere that people could live in, in the lower elevations. So maybe you could have it both ways. I go back and forth on this teeter-totter. But of course now it’s a kind of an older teeter-totter because we have a different problem now.

Links: Colonization of mars[Are We Going To Colonize Mars?]

Multifunctional Carbon Nanotubes – Introduction and Applications of Multifunctional Carbon Nanotubes

Image via Wikipedia

Over the past several decades there has been an explosive growth in research and development related to nano materials. Among these one material, carbon Nanotubes, has led the way in terms of its fascinating structure as well as its ability to provide function-specific applications ranging from electronics, to energy and biotechnology. Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) can be viewed as carbon whiskers, which are tubules of nanometer dimensions with properties close to that of an ideal graphite fiber. Due to their distinctive structures they can be considered as matter in one-dimension (1D).

In other words, a carbon nanotube is a honeycomb lattice rolled on to itself, with diameters of the order of nanometers and lengths of up to several micrometers. Generally, two distinct types of CNTs exist depending whether the tubes are made of more than one graphene sheet (multi walled carbon nanotube, MWNT) or only one graphene sheet (single walled carbon nanotube, SWNT). For a detailed description on CNTs please refer to the article by Prof. M. Endo.

A Truly Multifunctional Material

Irrespective of the number of walls, CNTs are envisioned as new engineering materials which possess unique physical properties suitable for a variety of applications. Such properties include large mechanical strength, exotic electrical characteristics and superb chemical and thermal stability. Specifically, the development of techniques for growing carbon nanotubes in a very controlled fashion (such as aligned CNT architectures on various substrates ) as well as on a large scale, presents investigators all over the world with enhanced possibilities for applying these controlled CNTs architectures to the fields of Vacuum microelectronics, Cold-cathode flat panel displays, Field emission devices, Vertical interconnect assemblies, Gas breakdown sensors, Bio Filtration, On chip thermal management, etc.

Apart from their outstanding structural integrity as well as chemical stability, the property that makes carbon nanotubes truly multifunctional in nature is the fact that carbon nanotubes have lot to offer (literally) in terms of specific surface area. Depending on the type of CNTs the specific surface areas may range from 50 m²/gm to several hundreds of m²/gm and with appropriate purification processes the specific surface areas can be increased up to ~1000 m²/gm.

Extensive theoretical and experimental studies have shown that the presence of large specific surface areas is accompanied by the availability of different adsorption sites on the nanotubes. For example, In CNTs produced using catalyst assisted chemical vapor deposition the adsorption occurs only on the outer surface of the curved cylindrical wall of the CNTs. This is because the production process of the CNTs using metal catalysts usually leads to nanotubes with closed ends, thereby restricting the access of the hollow interior space of the tube.

However, there are simple procedures (mild chemical or thermal treatments) which can remove the end caps of the MWNTs thereby presenting the possibility of another adsorption site (inside the tube) in MWNTs as schematically shown in Figure 1. Similarly, the large scale production process of SWNTs lead to the bundling of the SWNTs. Due to this bundling effect, SWNT bundles provide various high energy binding sites (for example grooves, Figure 1.). What this means is then that large surfaces are available in small volume and these surfaces can interact with other species or can be tailored and functionalized.

Figure 1: Possible binding sites available for adsorption on (left) MWNTs and (right) SWNTs surfaces.

Our group’s own research interests are directed into utilizing these materials in different applications related to energy and the environment, where their high specific surfaces areas play a crucial role. Two of such energy related applications are discussed below:

• CNT Based Electrochemical Double Layer Capacitors
• CNT Based catalyst support

CNT Based Electrochemical Double Layer Capacitors

Electrochemical Double Layer Capacitors (EDLC’s: Also referred to as Super Capacitors and Ultra-Capacitors) are envisioned as devices that will have the capability of providing high energy density as well as high power density. With extremely high life-span and charge-discharge cycle capabilities EDLC’s are finding versatile applications in the military, space, transportation, telecommunications and nanoelectronics industries.

An EDLC contains two non reactive porous plates (electrodes or collectors with extremely high specific surface area), separated by a porous membrane and immersed in an electrolyte. Various studies have shown the suitability of CNTs as EDLC electrodes. However, proper integration of CNTs with collector electrodes in EDLCs are needed for minimizing the overall device resistance in order to enhance the performance of CNT based supercapacitors. A strategy for achieving this could be growing CNTs directly on metal surfaces and using them as EDLC electrodes (Figure 2). EDLC electrodes with very low equivalent series resistance (ESR) and high power densities can be obtained by using such approaches.

Figure 2: (a) Artist rendition of EDLC formed by aligned MWNT grown directly on metals (b) An electrochemical impedance spectroscopy plot showing low ESR of such EDLC devices and (c) very symmetric and near rectangular cyclic voltamograms of such devices indicating impressive capacitance behavior.

CNT Based Catalyst Support

Catalysts play an important role in our existence today. Catalysts are small particles (~ 10^-9 meter, or nanometer) which due to their unique surface properties can enhance important chemical reactions leading to useful products. In any kind of catalytic process, the catalysts are dispersed on high surface area materials, known as the catalyst support. The support provides mechanical strength to the catalysts in addition to enhance the specific catalytic surface and enhancing the reaction rates. CNTs, due to their high specific surface areas, outstanding mechanical as well as thermal properties and chemically stability can potentially become the material of choice for catalyst support in a variety of catalyzed chemical reactions.

We are presently exploring the idea of using CNTs as catalyst support in the Fischer Tropsch (FT) synthesis process. The FT reaction can convert a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen in to a wide range of straight chained and branched olefins and paraffins and oxygenates (leading to the production of high quality synthetic fuels). Our preliminary FT synthesis experiments on CNT supported FT catalysts (generally cobalt and iron) shows that the conversion of CO and H₂ obtained with FT catalyst loaded CNTs is orders of magnitude higher than that obtained with conventional FT catalysts (Figure 3), indicating that CNTs offer a new breed of non-oxide based catalyst supports with superior performance for FT synthesis.

Figure 3:CNT paper used as catalyst support for FT synthesis and comparison of conversion ratio’s of Co and H2

So far, CNT research has provided substantial excitement, and novel possibilities in developing applications based on interdisciplinary nanotechnology. The area of large scale growth of CNTs is quiet mature now and hence it could be expected that several solid large volume applications will emerge in the near future.

[Source: Azonano]

Antarctica Mysteries[Part-II]: Haswell Island

By J. P. Skipper

So why am I reporting on evidence right here on Earth? In doing so I’m trying to show you via hard verifiable visual evidence that you need to pay attention to the reality that even planetary issues we all thought were long settled as much as decades and generations ago right here on Earth itself have also not been accurate. In fact, we may have been sold a secrecy bill of goods all over the place as the few benefit from the long conditioned ignorance of the many for control purposes and that this corrupts the very heart of our world and its populations. Sorry if this intrudes where some do not wish to go but there it is.

Meanwhile, the above 1st and 2nd images show the location of the evidence general site in this report as well as relative to the location of the evidence in the previous Report #195. As you can see, the sites are relatively nearby each other. In this report, the location is also the site of the originally Russian Mirny Station at the Davis sea coast. That in turn is supposed to be the coastal staging point for supplying the Russian Vostok Station located deep in the interior of the Antarctic continent some 1400 km from the coast.

Vostok Station is located near the South Geomagnetic Pole at the center of the deep East Antarctic Ice Sheet with the theory that this makes it an optimal place to observe changes in the Earth’s magnetic sphere. Vostok Station is 11,444 feet or 3,488 meters above sea level and is the most isolated established research station on the Antarctic continent with a small contingent of now multinational scientists. Deep under Vostok Station and under very deep ice is Vostok Lake.

Russian Vostok Station was established in 1957 while Mirny Station was established the year before in 1956. Both were established about 10 years or so after the USA secretive military Antarctic expedition in force (Operation Highjump) to Antarctica in 1946-47 right after WWII. Some believe that the true purpose of the military force was chasing after escaping Nazi forces while others also bring aliens into the issue, both officially denied. You should know that the general area where Mirny Station is located was also first discovered in 1902 by the German Gauss Expedition and named Kaiser Wilhelm II Land suggesting at the least some German early knowledge of the area dating back to that time before WWI and WWII.

This reporting will briefly examine the Russian Mirny Station area out on the ice and in some low rocks near larger more elevated Haswell Island as well as some suggestive anomalous evidence at Haswell Island itself. You’ll be the judge as to whether that poor resolution visual evidence may suggest civilization evidence and why Mirny Station was at some later point moved inland off the bare ice sheet but apparently avoided moving onto Haswell Island even though it has more elevated rocky mostly ice free terrain complete with fresh water in a liquid state and strangely bypassing it to settle beyond it on the more difficult ice terrain.

The above 3rd and 4th still distant view images zero in on the general evidence site closer with the 4th image identifying the evidence scattered over a wide area. Now remember that some of the visual evidence is just of Mirny Station with nothing especially anomalous about it. I’ve included this kind of evidence here so that you know that the evidence I will point out as being anomalous is not to be confused with the not particularly anomalous Mirny Station evidence and where the anomalous evidence is located relative to Mirny Station.

For example, note that long line that is an ice breaker trail passing to the left of Haswell Island with the ice breaker ship in the trail? There is nothing particularly anomalous about it until it gets to the very top of the image where the trail doesn’t stop so much as it disappears underneath a heavy application of dense smudge image tampering at the coast. Note that near the bottom of the image and to the left of the ice breaker trail is a rocky island with multiple old round likely fuel tanks isolated on it. On the lower right of the ice breaker trail is the Mirny Station sites complete with structures dating back to the days of the USSR as well as signs of ground activity. Note that they are located inland bypassing Haswell Island which is between the Davis Sea coast and the station.

The most anomalous evidence is at Haswell Island itself identified by the red arrows. One has to wonder why this nearby larger essentially iceless rocky island complete with what appears to be green tinted fresh water on it in an unfrozen liquid state was passed by and not eventually settled as the most climate friendly main station site? Could it be that there are things there that preclude such a settlement? You be the judge as the evidence unfolds below here in this report. Be forewarned that most of this anomalous evidence is compromised by poor visual quality due to being at the limit of resolution as well as a lot of image tampering treatments.

As you can see in the above 5th and 6th images, an ice breaker ship has created a trail or path through the ice field from the coast to a point inland just beyond Haswell Island. The ship appears to have turned around and is now exiting back down its own trail toward the coast which area is hidden under smudge treatments.

Note that the trail as seen lower in the 4th image passes between the small rocky island with the large round tanks on it on the left and the active location of Mirny Station on the right. It is assumed that the tanks have likely served as longer term fuel storage mostly for any ships including the ice breaker using the created channel through the ice field and their isolated location on the small rocky island is an isolation safety factor.

On the other hand, why be so secretive in using the smudge obfuscation field at the top of the image to hide that portion of the ice breaker trail where it obviously has to exist at the coastal area? What is it there at the coastal area that someone doesn’t wish us to see?

The above 7th, 8th and 9th images are all associated with the Mirny Station facilities dating back as much as 54 years and are not particularly anomalous. As you can see, the 7th image is of the tank site and the 8th and 9th images demonstrate a collection of Mirny Stations structures scattered in the ice and rocks around in the terrain. Some likely date back to 1946 when the station was first established and in later years. Most of the tanks for example look very old. This kind of evidence is included here to demonstrate what the Mirny Station area looks like, where it is located, and why it should not be confused with the more anomalous evidence located at the Haswell Island sites as follows.

The above 10th image of Haswell Island serves as the locator image for the more anomalous evidence in this report. There is plenty of anomalous evidence at this site but most of it is so image resolution and smudge image tampering compromised that not much can be made of it with any real confidence and so I’ve skipped over that. The samplings that I have pointed out here suffer from this problem as well but a little less compromised and I suspect some of you will find them suggestive and interesting.

The above 11th image demonstrates a fairly large long ribbon of green tinted fresh water in the Haswell Island rocky terrain. Note that it, like the many water sites reported on in my last Report 195, is in an impossible liquid state in this extremely freezing cold and windy terrain of the coastal area of the Antarctic continent, the coldest place on Earth. There are also two fairly large lakes below this point and near the site of the tower or spire shaped object.

As you can see, the above 12th, 13th, and 14th images, each panning from left to right in sequence demonstrate a lot of evidence that suggests civilization even though it is at the limit of visual resolution and has been compromised by a lot of smudge treatments. The presence of all that extensive smudge suggests to me that an extensive amount of larger more recognizable objects have likely been hidden from our view leaving only the smaller evidence for us to see a bit of.

The red arrows point out some of the better evidence but do not by any stretch encompass all of it. I suspect that what we are able to see represents only the most minor of the total evidence at this Haswell Island site and why it was left out of the worst of the tampering. If so, we’re talking about a very extensive amount of development here that cannot be adequately explained by national or multinational research stations or military activities, not even secret ones.

With that thought in mind, add the fact that Mirny Station is located out in the ice on some scrubby rocks with residents running around in dirty ice and mud slush instead of this big elevated rock island with its extensive relatively ice free terrain and liquid fresh water suggesting a less severe warmer (geothermal?) climate. Avoiding this more favorable site just doesn’t make sense to me. It logically suggests that this Haswell Island locale is being intentionally avoided. If so, the obvious question is why?

The above 15th image is another one demonstrating a smaller group of likely geometric shaped structures. Some will argue that these shapes are caused by imaging and/or processing artifacts and that this is the same with the previous 12th, 13th, and 14th image evidence. Without getting into technical discussions, this isn’t image artifacts but this observation is based on experience and others wishing to avoid the truth will still want to have their way. So let them think whatever they will.

The above 16th image primarily demonstrates a close in shot of a tall tower in the terrain casting a lengthy dark shadow. I got as close as I could with this piece of evidence because I want you to also take a careful look at the brown tinted fluffy texture look that is characteristic of a lot of the rocky terrain. I suspect this brownish fluffy look to be carefully applied smudge image tampering. I suspect that the small lighter color area around the base of the tower and at other small spots to be the real terrain color.

I suspected this as well in my last Report 195 of that locale but didn’t feel comfortable enough in making the observation publicly. The brownish texture looks good and holds up well in more distant views but begins to have problems the close one examines it. If you will look close, even though this is suppose to be raw rocky terrain devoid of any tree growth obscuring it, the brownish areas a actually devoid of any real texture except for some lighter and darker shadings that only mimic rocky irregularities.

Likewise, except for the tower and its shadow, there simply are no other shadows small or large in this image’s terrain. When one spreads out the view from the tower, there simply are no objects casting shadows and this is just not how real elevated rocky terrain looks. The only dark areas are either water or dark places that are highly suspicious as tampering applications or crack and crevassing dark interiors.

The above 17th and last image demonstrates a long continuous object of unknown origin or makeup. It is colored like the rocks that surround it and may be just more rock? However, more than likely its visual surface texture and color is a result of careful smudge treatments applied to it as well as to the surrounding rocks causing it to blend in with those surfaces. However, that long continuous cylinder shape looks suspiciously anomalous to me with its long slender but massive uniformity. It reminds me of a long cylinder shaped object falling from the sky wedging into this site and becoming a permanent fixture in it. Could it be some strange ancient ship?

The two small red arrows point out other suspicious objects associated with questions. What I have identified as fresh water in the upper left portion of the image is identified as such despite the white ice presence due to its green tint no doubt caused by what I’ve come to learn is the algae typically present in the Antarctic unfrozen fresh water environments. It was the same in the earlier Report 195 and the many unfrozen fresh water sites there. In comparison, salt water sites are characterized by a sunlight reflectivity blue tint.

So what’s the bottom line here? Why should this be of any importance to you? In my opinion, it is a matter of truthfulness and the lack of it coming from the most influential parties on this planet. How are we populations ever to advance when information pathways to us are filled with worthless tripe, false information, and lies?

As for me, I suspect that old past research expeditions into the Antarctic environment have along and along discovered pre-existing civilization evidence in this area. I suspect the main publicly known expedition involved in this was the 1946-47 military recon in force to Antarctica named Operation Highjump. I suspect that this civilization evidence is regarded as a potential resource for gaining advanced technological advantage and therefore kept secret from a public that might object to our trying to raid this resource and/or might want to freak out if it is alien and they knew of that with certainty.

I suspect that so much extensive and blatant smudge treatments on the Antarctic continent tell us just how extensive this kind of evidence in larger more obvious forms may be. Just as I suspected with the Moon, I suspect the reason that the Antarctic land in Report 195 and the Haswell Island locale in this report and likely other undiscovered sites have not been settled on by us is because there is already someone there in the best spots active and perfectly capable of defending their territory.

If so, why would they allow our settlements so close to them as is the case here with Haswell Island and Mirny Station? I have no crystal ball insight into that but I suspect it is logically part of a program by others to allow our kind an arms length proximity drawn by the bait like flies to honey of technological gain that eventually generates familiarity and a gradual reduction of fear driven aggression reaction on our kind’s part. Of course I could also just be full of it on this to. Certainly that would be the official take and those that do not want to be disturbed reaction to such comments, but then there is all that extensive smudge to explain away too.

Earth humans have assumed from the very beginnings of our current civilization and all during it that the Earth is solely our place to dominate and not to be shared in this way with anyone else. It’s the same with the Moon right over our heads every night. However, that may be erred assumptions based on pretense and not based on fact. We may find that we have behaved in our assumptions like the preverbal Ostrich with its head buried in the sand pretending that it is safe and believing in what we want to believe. Could it be that someone who is not us has an older and better claim to parts of this world?

Those that are use to thinking alone and independently may not be especially disturbed by this concept and keep moving on forward. On the other hand, those conditioned to follow and unable to operate without a community herd psychology may have a lot of trouble with this concept. Where do you think you fit into this picture?

As for me, it doesn’t bother me. Rather, if true, as long as I am alive I will be moving cautiously but also excited about stretching my mind grasping at new concepts and insights that differences will inevitably bring. I’m ready to pioneer with anyone who is ready to pioneer with me and pursue beneficial avenues for all.

So what’s so dangerous about operating within a herd psychology? Think about it. As just one lone example, cancer is a great killer of humans and the battle against it consumes billions of people’s lives world wide and their wealth which at the same time also enriches great world industries. A cheap and readily available cure would benefit populations in the billions immensely but also destroy the great industries that parasite off of this terrible scourge. It’s the same with energy and its consumption. Note that the most influential people in the world are also the richest. How do you think that came about?

What choice do you think the richest most influential people (the few) would make if they could control knowledge of a cancer cure or a source of commonly available cheap energy not subject to centralized control and not subject to population checks and balances? Got any doubts about the answer to that? It’s not about to happen. Why? Because the suffering of the many benefits the few in mega ways important to them and it is how they got to be the richest and most influential by acquiring and keeping advantage under wraps and blocking it from common public knowledge.

The world may be a more complex place than we’ve allowed ourselves to imagine but there is nothing insurmountable about it for knowledgeable involved and participating populations. Yet we willing sink into ignorance and participate in the world’s ills by avoidance and abrogating our own responsibilities to a few who then in turn vampire off of us with our blessing. They pee down our collective collar while convincing us that it is only raining. Meanwhile, I suspect others watch to see if we can break these chains of our own making but worse, they are likely judging our fitness to fit in their greater environments.

Recommended Reading: Antarctica Mysteries

Related Articles

• Antarctica Mysteries (weirdsciences.net)

Antarctica Mysteries

By J. P. Skipper

For any who wish to track behind me, the above 1st image is included here to help locate the evidence site on the coastal area of Antarctica at the Southern Sea but inland from the coast. When zooming in on this site in Google Earth, one will encounter a narrow pale blue strip at this location within which the evidence reported on here resides. That pale blue strip is a corridor of high resolution surrounded by an extensive sea of smudge obfuscation and that narrow higher resolution strip is the sole reason why we are able to view just a little truth here.

The above 2nd image is another context locator image but this time closer and showing what the pale blue narrow strip of higher resolution looks like and the location of the main evidence sites within it. If the whole of the Antarctica continent was revealed at this kind of higher resolution, there is no telling what many kinds of truths would be revealed to us in the public. Further, one can’t help but get angry when one realizes that we in the public treated as a bunch of dummies are otherwise disrespectfully fed a load of unmentionable material even though we paid for the real thing but certainly aren’t getting that in return.

The above 3rd image is an example of what I mean. The white blank smooth area in the upper left corner of the image is smudge image tampering obfuscation as viewed relative to and side-by-side with a relatively much clearer not obfuscated right portion of the image. Note the sharp straight boundary between the two fields. Note how a portion of the big rough chunk of broken ice casting a dark shadow and with the red arrow on it disappears up under this smudge coating and how nothing more of it, not even a suggestion of it, can be seen through the smudge demonstrating just how thick and obscuring the smudge really is.

Note also that because the Antarctica continent is in theory mostly covered by snow and ice and snow and that solid particulate is so bright sunlight reflective, we likely wouldn’t know the difference if we were looking around in the smudge areas and encountered only some occasional poorly seen blurry rocks. We would likely just pass the poor visibility and lack of any detail off as due to the bright white sunlight reflectivity, fog, etc. However, the above A-B comparison and ruler straight boundary reveals the real truth as to the presence of the obfuscation and this comes to us only because someone by mistake or intent (rebels within?) allowed this narrow satellite strip of truth to be included and come through to us.

By the way, that light green/bluish tint surface that may look like land to you in the above 3rd image is actually very old thick ice floating on water with the edge of the dark water just visible in the upper right corner of the image. I suspect that the ice is tinted this color because it is almost certainly fresh water with microbial life in and on the ice causing the tint. Be glad of it because it is also causing the ice to be less sunlight reflective compared to the big elevated iceberg chunks also present. This slight darker sunlight absorbing rather than sunlight reflecting quality contributes to our being able to see better detail rather than it being washed out in white color.

In any case, as we move up this narrow corridor of higher more true imaging resolution, let’s examine a few mysteries along the way in the evidence as follows.

The above 4–5th and 6–7th image sets are of the same type of evidence in two separate locations not very far from each other in this narrow corridor of Google-Antarctica imaging truth. For the lack of a better term I’ve called these two sites “blowholes” and their general location is in the labeling in the 2nd image in this report. However, blowhole is misleading as you will see below.

This evidence at first resembles blowholes such as that caused by volcanism created heat deep down below that in turn causes heated water to rise and exit as a vent on the surface and so it is natural to interpret these two sites as that. However, take a closer look at these two holes in the 4th and 6th images.

Note that the ice in the hole downward slope is mostly and oddly confined to the left site of the hole in both sites. Also note that this ice on the left side has a slight greenish tint to it as compared to the rest of the snow/ice in the hole’s general vicinity. This indicates that the source of this ice on the left is from within the hole as compared to the other vicinity ice which is much more likely surface snow/ice in origin.

If this was a natural water vent, we should expect that the water with the slight green tint exiting the hole would be much more generally distributed and spread around the hole and its outer surface areas. The fact that the slight green tint ice is confined to the left side only in two separate sites is a bit anomalous and suspicious. Also, note that both holes are elliptical in shape and oriented in the same direction which is again a bit anomalous.

Now it could be that the left side of each site represents a depression relative to the higher rest of the sides of the holes. If so, it could be that heated water welling up from below but not really fully venting may on occasion rise and push into the depressions and then drain back in the hole leaving water behind on the left side to shortly freeze into the slightly green tinted ice. Unfortunately, this straight down satellite view doesn’t allow us to determine if this possibility may be so.

On the other hand, both sites separate some distance from each other have a little too many similarities that strains the chance factor considerably. It is also possible that they are permanent but camouflaged exit points in rocky terrain for some solid wide but flattened objects exiting from underground to the surface environs always in the same direction and via passage first through the water and then up in the air carrying water shedding off the object always dropping off in the same place on the hole left side.

It would have helped considerably if this higher resolution strip would have encompassed a larger general area of this terrain as opposed to this narrow corridor. Perhaps there is more of this type of evidence to see that could be more informative as context information? Unfortunately, the view here is just too narrow a slice to be drawing much in the way of definitive conclusions. At this point there’s just enough truth for it to be really anomalous and suspicious. The key to the above Antarctica evidence is inland fresh water presence in a liquid unfrozen state and the next evidence below will be of this as well.

Before getting into that, did you know that statistically this continent contains 70% of Earth’s fresh water? Of course most of that is suppose to be in the form of snow/ice solid particulates laying around sometimes thousands of feet deep on as well as offshore of the continent. You should know that the average temperature in the Antarctic is –49º C with the coldest temperature on record and the coldest on Earth being –128.6º F or –89º C. In other words, its very cold and most of the time far below the freezing point of fresh water.

However, in the peak of summer the temperature can rise to a whopping 41º F (5º C) to 59º F (15º C) for a very short time. Note that these temperatures are above the freezing temperature of water at sea level but remember that such “warm” temperatures can last for only a few weeks with little impact on large bodies of ice.

With that said, the above 8th image demonstrates a considerable size inland body of green tinted water in a liquid state embedded in elevated rocky terrain. Note that there is no floating ice and only very small residual patches of snow/ice in terrain depressions around the site. That is very significant. Further, this is just a single sample and there is many times more of this same unfrozen liquid water evidence north of this point in this rocky terrain not shown here. There is so much in fact that incredibly it all represents an extensive network of mostly interconnected and mostly navigable large water ways.

Considering that this incredibly is located in the supposedly coldest freezing conditions on Earth where ice extreme thickness lasts for thousands of years without melting, this large area of fresh water presence in a liquid state is extremely anomalous. Also, since there is hardly any ice presence even right at the lake shorelines, we can assume the fact that it is not frozen over likely means that this is deep water right up to the shorelines and perhaps even lightly geothermally heated from below over a large area.

Note that the rocky terrain is also mostly free of snow/ice. This too is typical of the overall site as viewed in Google Earth. Obviously, the temperatures in this general area may be cold from our point of view but the visual evidence here clearly demonstrates that it is just not cold enough to support extensive snow/ice presence no matter what is “suppose” to be the case in Antarctica.

With that thought in mind, I’ve tried to look closely time permitting to see if I could see any signs of civilization evidence in this liquid fresh water mile temperature lost world but I see none that stand out enough to really identify as such. If any is there on a size scale large enough to see at this strips resolution, it has been carefully erased to blend in with the rocky terrain which is itself too uniform in coloring causing me to suspect tampering. If that suspicion is true, then someone has allowed us to see the liquid fresh water sites but anything more than that is apparently taboo.

On the other hand, the above 9th image evidence is located over on the right edge area of the rocky terrain going out into snow/ice fields. It demonstrates what clearly appears to be green tinted surface water shallows also in a liquid state. Note that the left side of the water site is shallow liquid water while the right side seems to be a darker tinted green and likely biological growth of some kind on wetlands associated with the water site with the growth doing its conversion of sunlight to chlorophyll thing.

Note that, although plenty of snow/ice is present all around the site, the water is still in at least a partial liquid self leveling state. I’ve included a view of this evidence because the water is unmistakable even in outer terrain areas like this and this site also seems to present the added bonus of living bio-life evidence as well on dryer ground.

The above 10th image serves as the context locator image for the 8th and 9th image’s liquid surface water site evidence pointed out with the red arrows. The many small red “X’s” in the image represents a sampling of the other largest water sites. In addition, there are many lakes and entirely landlocked smaller bodies of liquid water that are present in this area. I have not bothered to point out or document here in this reporting because it would take just too many images.

Above the large water body sites you will see a lot of jumbled ice presence and these for the most part represent water sites where the water depth is more shallow allowing more ice to form. At the same time there is a great deal of large broken up sections of old floating ice presence in the upper area that suggest this area has in the past been more covered with ice. It may be that the external weather temperature has not warmed so much as the land itself geothermally from below (?) resulting in melt and floating ice breaking up.

Please note in this 10th context image how closely the rocky terrain visible out of the snow/ice with this liquid water evidence is so closely boundaried by the ever present smudge obfuscation fields on either side. It almost seems that someone intentionally fitted this corridor of higher resolution satellite imaging just so that this fabulous huge and extensive unfrozen navigable liquid water site geology could be found by someone in the otherwise heavy obfuscation of Antarctica. Who do we thank, aliens or rebels?

With not only ice free deep fresh water lakes as well as deep water navigable winding waterways and large open bodies of fresh water in networks and a mostly snow/ice free rocky terrain extensive landscape clearly demonstrating ice free milder temperatures, one has to ask why are humans in the Antarctic freezing in other much more difficult to contend with locations. This seems like a much more practical location for a permanent settlement supplied by air with a real landing strip.

Could it be that there is something recognizable out there secret and hidden from our sight under those boundary smudge obfuscation fields that would preclude the consideration of such a human settlement presence? Could it also be that there is evidence at this site that even I cannot recognize as that anomalous because it is just too unfamiliar to even my eye? Indeed, it you choose to close inspect this area in Google Earth to confirm my findings here, there is much here in this rocky outcrop area that is very strange looking and therefore speculative and especially in the upper environs.

The above 11th image is a sample of some of this strange looking evidence looking very much like a lot that I’ve seen on Mars. In this image it is a dense tangled web of crisscrossing ribbons that appear to exist on formerly wet fresh water site bottoms that are now exposed to the air.

Note how some of the longer ribbons above are not straight but tend to wander around while still going in a specific purposeful direction. In the upper environs this is typical as are the presence of densely packed knobs by the thousands just out of definition reach of the image base resolution. Also, in other nearby locations these wandering type continuous ribbons seem to connect and/or bridge between multiple very white fresh water ice masses scattered at random throughout the terrain as though they were paths created by something purposefully accessing the fresher whiter ice not suffused with the green tint. In other cases, the irregular but continuous ribbons also seem to serve as dams blocking floating ice and forming enclosures with floating ice sections in them. Someone managing ice chunks?

The question becomes does this represent some form of life that we are unfamiliar with and find hard to recognize? Perhaps life that does not lay out its systems in very rigid geometric shape as do we Earth humans? The resolution is great enough in this strip to raise more questions but it is not good enough to answer other questions.

The above 12th image is in my opinion an evidence debris field site located just north above the 4th—7th image evidence sites and well below the many fresh water sites area. Now let’s understand that this evidence is very suggestive rather than in any way definitive. The red arrows point to some of the more suggestive evidence.

This does appear to be a chaotic debris field consisting of partially buried and exposed objects, some of which should be of major interest. At least I think they should be of interest to any archaeologist with even a small amount of curiosity but who can think some outside the box as to the possibilities. I know that I would love to be part of any expedition to this place that believes in truth. Is that giant rounded object in the lower left the remains of the leading edge of a partially burled disk type craft or some other tremendous rounded structure that met its fate in some ancient cataclysm?

I must say that suggestive level evidence abounds in this report of this general site that encourages speculation as to both current and ancient alien presence that the image strip alone cannot adequately answer. On the other hand, who would have ever expected to find in Antarctica the coldest place on Earth a very large site literally littered with deep fresh water in a liquid state? Is it a lost world or just someone else’s world?

Either way, if I am the first to publicly discover and report on this incredible unfrozen liquid fresh water evidence (?) in Antarctica, I think I’d like to call it “Skipper Land,” something I’ve never done before. However, my irrelevant personal desires aside, make no mistake about it, here’s the bottom line with this hard visual evidence from Google Earth.

The at least now public discovery of this undeniable area of surface water in a liquid state and the lack of significant snow/ice presence in this rocky terrain area of Antarctica, supposedly the coldest place on Earth, will have official types and debunkers scrambling and back pedaling for explanations. As damage control they will be trying to convince us that this is just the result of a “natural” underlying geothermal hot spot in the land that is causing these obvious very isolated warmer conditions and that such sites are extremely rare. Such an explanation will to the innocent likely sound fairly reasonable and many will accept it mostly because they want to.

However, let’s think about this a little deeper. In all the many past decades of various settlements established by many nations around on this continent and its many coastal ice masses, why has this obvious warmer conditions site not already been settled? After all, these warmer conditions and fresh water and the location on land just inland from the coast make it ideal. Who would want to explore a frozen continent from the bases that we do have established where one is freezing one’s buns off and it is life threatening deadly to go outside without extreme cold weather gear on? Does this make any sense to you?

Likewise, look again at image #3 near the top of this report. See that obfuscating smudge blotting out every thing in the land beneath its applications in the upper left corner and side of the image. I would guess that the bulk of the Antarctica continent is hidden from view in this way in varying degrees. WHY? Surely this question must occur to you. What is it that someone doesn’t want us to see in Antarctica? Why is it necessary to obscure most of an entire continent in the satellite imaging rather than just some isolated places? Remember, this is a large continent and not just an island at the lower end of this world.

I remind you once again that shortly after WWII an “expeditionary” military force (an entire fleet including an aircraft carrier) of ships and thousands of men were sent to Antarctica for “exploration” purposes. Of course such a large military force commitment suggests a covert secret mission cranking up the rumor and denial mills. Further, although this is officially denied, it has been rumored that two atomic blasts were set off some where at or near Antarctica back in those post WWII times. In fact, although I didn’t understand the significance of this at the time some years ago and didn’t preserve it, I’ve seen pictures that included a fleet of ships in the foreground, a completely snow and ice covered landmass and mountain range in the far background, and an unmistakable atomic blast between the ships and the landmass. The presence of a high mountain range suggested Antarctica.

I don’t know about you but to me that’s a lot of USA military activity in force after WWII was over. It’s also a huge expenditure of money, materials, and man power post WWII (with USA citizens in lean times economically recovering from the war effort) to allegedly test military post war cold weather military operations in case of future war with the old USSR and/or investigate the frozen desolate home of a bunch of cold hardy seals and penguins or even a few isolated diehard freezing Nazis.

Could it be that those few freezing Nazis, if they existed at all, were interacting with someone else long established there and that this someone else was the true target of the USA military operation and that the Nazi presence was just a covering misdirection rumor in case it was needed? If so, the continued obfuscation of Antarctica in the satellite imaging into the present tells us that control of the continent was likely NOT established by this military operation. Further, if the story of atomics being used is true, it suggests that who ever is there is able to withstand the use of atomics, were not impressed, and perhaps we’ve had to accept some compromises with respect to who controls the bulk of this land?

On the other hand, is someone who is us here on Earth trying to hide the habitable conditions in Antarctica to give themselves the time to establish a firm military control presence there? In light of the fact that other nations could monitor such activity via their own satellite over flight imaging, this does not seem very likely.

That’s a lot of speculation but then there is the fact of all the obfuscation applications covering most of an entire continent as sampled in image #3 here and that undeniable liquid surface water presence in images #8 and #9 clearly demonstrating warmer conditions. That kind of hard verifiable imaging evidence is hard to get around and explain away. Could it be that someone else not us right here on Earth is calling the shots in this land confining our settlements to its periphery?

Now all that visual obfuscation is there for a reason and so I suspect this report may hit a soar spot among the secrecy types. So I suggest that all of you around the world who can please go quickly to this spot in Google Earth (following my visual directions) to download, document, and preserve this evidence before it can be sanitized following this reporting.

Addendum Added 12/12/2010: It appears that the site of this evidence and its year round unfrozen fresh water in a liquid state is named Bunger Hills and was first discovered and filmed by a seaplane flight in 1947 commanded by Navy Lieutenant David E. Bunger surveying and filming as part of the infamous military 1946/1947 Navy expedition in force named US Navy Operation Highjump overall commanded by Rear Admiral Richard E. Byrd, Jr. It seems the plane landed on the water confirming temperatures of 38º and that it was fresh water. Note that I’ve included duplicating material video links below containing 1940s film of this discovery just in case some links are lost in the future. The site is located about about 220 miles or 350 km from the Russian Mirny Station to the west that is part of my Report 196.

I’ve checked the coordinates and the Bunger Hills location is the same as that in my report. Of the great many lakes in this area, the largest and longest is Algae Lake (aka Lake Figurnoye) some 16 miles or 25 km long and up to 449 feet or 137 meters deep. Admiral Byrd described the area as “…..one of the most remarkable regions on Earth. An island suitable for life had been found in a universe of death.” Also, apparently the Russians attempted to establish a small station on this site in 1956 named Oazis later turned over to Poland in 1959 and renamed Dobrowolski Station none of which amounted to much and eventually was abandoned.

This information is important as context but it really doesn’t have that much to do with my reporting and observations except to confirm formal discovery and awareness of this site by others prior to my reporting. I’m not going to bother with it but if someone were to go to the trouble of making a very careful survey of the entire site in this reasonably good imaging and no evidence of the Oazis/Dobrowolski Station sites were revealed, I would suspect the presence of careful image tampering inadvertently covering this visual information.

[Source: Mars Anomaly Research]

Self Replication in Alien Life Forms: Alien Sex?

Image via Wikipedia

By R. A. Freitas

Of all the important things life forms do, self-reproduction seems quite unique. Deprive an animal of its food or drink, draw off its blood, or cut away its skeleton, and it dies. But prevent an animal from reproducing and, usually, nothing happens. The species may eventually become extinct, but the individual organism lives out its lifespan. Reproduction of self is an important asset but is not absolutely essential for life – even on Earth.

This is true despite protests that self-replication is somehow the entire point of biological activity. The vast majority of social insects never engage in personal self-reproduction, yet these species are extremely successful. The anatomy of domesticated turkeys has been altered by breeding for plumpness so that these animals can no longer mate in the natural way and must be artificially inseminated with human help. A number of higher Earth species such as the mule are quite sterile, yet do not become extinct.

Indeed, an intelligent extraterrestrial race might lack the capability of individual direct self-replication. We might imagine two closely allied nonsentient alien species among whom, when a successful interspecies mating occurs (or in a special way or in a special environment), sterile but intelligent “mule” offspring are the result of the union. Clearly there is no bar to the rise of intelligence in such a situation – the hybrid’s brain mass. neural complexity, or level of organization may be qualitatively greater than those of its non-sentient parents. Our intelligent but sterile race would maintain their numbers by corraling and manipulating the “dumb” mixed parental population much as stockmen raise choice cattle and stablemen breed champion thoroughbreds.

It is entirely possible that some very complex extraterrestrial living creatures may have no need to reproduce themselves at all, either personally or at the species level. One class of such beings might be self-creating but non-replicating organisms, analogous to very advanced robots capable of making continual repairs and of upgrading their own mechanisms periodically. Other nonreproductive lifeforms might increase their numbers simply by physically expanding and then dividing into pieces of various sizes – biomass increases as easily by growing to larger volumes as by replicating a large number of small originals.

There could even exist a race which evolves by means of acquired characteristics. Such lifeforms would neither die nor reproduce, but would instead modify their parts to survive in a changing environment. Selection would act internally on their constitutions, rather than on a succession of descendent organisms. The closest analogies, according to Dr. P.H.A. Sneath, are terrestrial soils, which don’t reproduce in the usual sense but are complexly organized systems nevertheless. Soils respond to environmental changes, arise where there is rock and wind to erode it, and are virtually immortal. If ever they tried to “compete” with their neighbors, such soil-like organisms would blend together with a total loss of individuality.

Finally, reproduction is not a prerequisite for sex. Two dissimilar growth systems could trade genetic information about their expansion patterns, then each continue growing in a slightly different way. This would be an example of “sexual growth” without replication. Of course, self-reproduction does have many advantages. Whole-body duplication allows rapid dispersion into new niches and produces abundant biological alternatives upon which natural selection may operate. It is a telling observation that most complex terrestrial creatures are capable of self-replication. Assuming Earth is a typically exotic planet, we should expect that many, though certainly not all. extraterrestrials will be reproducers.

Is Sex Necessary?

If reproduction is a useful convenience for a species, sex seems almost pure luxury. Certainly there is no fundamental reason why evolution and diversity cannot thrive in its absence. There is no universal law prohibiting asexuality.

In fact, asexuals can be vastly more prolific in the short run. Microorganisms chum out literally billions of copies in the space of a few hours, relying almost exclusively on such simple techniques as binary fission and budding. No “opposite sex” is customarily required. While it is true that many sexual species are also quite fecund, as a general rule fewer offspring are produced than among the asexuals.

Furthermore, asexual reproduction is good economics from the personal point of view. An organism which copies itself without sex passes undiluted its entire genetic heritage to its young. Offspring are exact duplicates of the originals. A bisexual parent, on the other hand, normally contributes only half of its own genes towards the construction of an offspring. The other half must be donated by the second parent. From the standpoint of the selfish gene, sex entails a rather poor profit margin in comparison to no-sex.

Except …

A completely asexual species produces a population of virtual duplicates, save an occasional mutation. Since variation is the raw material of evolution, and the lack of sex decreases the breadth of this variation, such creatures are a distinct disadvantage when competing with their sexual brethren. New genetic combinations in asexual species can accumulate only by a sequence of fortuitous mutations in the same family lineage. Asexuals must “stand in line” to wait for a series of rare mutations.” Change spreads only slowly through the gene pool.

Sex allows the accumulation of variation in parallel, rather than in series. In a sexual species many new genes can spread rapidly throughout the population because gene-jumbling produces a novel combination (possibly of several new genes at once) with each act of reproduction. Rare mutations become more widely distributed. So great are the advantages of sex that even many normally asexual organisms have occasional sexual encounters to beef up the waning gene pool. This is especially true in particularly harsh or rapidly changing environments.

For example, both the freshwater hydra and the aphid reproduce asexually for most of the year. As winter approaches. with hard times ahead, these animals switch over to sexual reproduction. This ensures genetic diversity when the colonies disband and disperse with the arrival of cold weather.

In the billion years or so since its invention, sex has proven remarkably successful – if we are to judge from the fossil record of life on this planet. Sexual species dominate the animal world, and the most widespread and important groups are all but exclusively sexual in their mode of reproduction. What of the creatures of other worlds? We don’t know whether all alien species must have chromosomes, genes, or some other information-carrying molecules – perhaps some extraterrestrials reproduce by a process akin to xerography. But two things are clear: Variability is the key to biological complexity and survival, and sex reshuffles the biological data deck nonpareil.

 

How Many Sexes?

Not all Earth creatures are bisexual. Terrestrial biology offers several examples of multisexual reproduction. One interesting case is the lowly paramecium, which has between five and ten sexes depending on how you count. These are distinct mating forms which arise at different times under definite conditions, and which can only mate in certain specific combinations. Another example is certain quadrisexual fungi, notably Basidiomycetes, in which there are four distinct sexual groupings. Among the higher animals, greylag geese display an evolved sociobiological “behavioral trisexuality.” One goose “marries” and mates with two male ganders. Multisexuality is clearly a viable alternative.

Why, then, are the vast majority of terrestrial sexual lifeforms bisexual?

The answer seems to be that one sexual partner is just enough to properly shuffle the genetic deck. Each healthy individual has a reasonable chance of mating with a member of the opposite sex. Apparently, two are both necessary and sufficient. ^More than this may seriously impair the chances for species continuity. The more sexes required for successful reproduction, the more difficult it is to bring them all together properly at just the right time. The greater the number of links in the mating chain, the greater is the chance that the species may become vulnerable to certain predators or other environmental severities, thus jeopardizing the future of the entire race. And it is not clear how, say, three sexes could generate variability very much more effectively than two.

So while extraterrestrial multi-sexuality cannot be ruled out, requiring more than two sexes for reproductive activity seems an unnecessarily complicated solution to a problem elegantly resolved using only two. It’s a safe bet that bisexuality is the overwhelmingly dominant mode of sexual reproduction among the alien lifeforms in our Galaxy.

 

The Bisexual Universe

Assuming that most sexually-reproducing ETs will have just two sexes, bisexuality does not necessarily demand the existence of distinct male and female forms. A case in point is the black mold Rhizopus nigricans, which displays an unusual form of reproduction known as “heterethallism.” This species of fungus is bisexual, inasmuch as two organisms are required for fertilization and replication to take place. However, the two sexes are physically indistinguishable. There are no constant differences between members of opposite mating groups other than their reciprocal behavior when crossed. Thus, it is impossible to designate one form of the black mold as male and the other as female. Customarily the complementary groups are labeled merely “+” and “-” for convenience during experiments.

One can imagine a race of intelligent extraterrestrials apparently unisexual to our undisceming eyes but which actually practice heterothallic sex. Such beings would most certainly lack secondary sexual characteristics, those hormone-induced physical landmarks such as beards and breasts to which we humans are so pleasantly accustomed. They might even lack distinctive primary sexual characteristics such as internal or external gonads. Norms of marriage, inheritance, language, religion and social behavior would be profoundly affected by this state of affairs. The usual social tensions caused by sexual competition in human cultures would be more diffuse in a society in which every member was a potential mate and in which all could become pregnant. though sexual undercurrents might arise in all interpersonal relationships. The disparate male/female roles in human social roles and courtship rituals would defy their understanding, and to heterothallic ETs, human males – who participate in reproductive acts for pleasure but cannot become pregnant as a consequence – might be judged especially pitiful, handicapped, even perverted creatures.

Assuming maleness and femaleness exist among most bisexual alien species, there are again major variations in Earthly biology. It is quite possible to have an organism which is neither strictly female nor strictly male, but rather exhibits some alternating or intermediate condition. For example, simultaneous hermaphrodites possess at once both female and male sex organs. Ovaries and testes are present together in the same individual. Matings occur in pairs, with each partner serving both sexual roles at the same time. Planarians, earthworms, sponges and snails fall into this category, and a few simultaneous hermaphrodites among the more highly evolved vertebrates are known, such as the banded flamefish Serranus subltgarius.

Such intersexual animals can be sex-mosaics in time as well. Many creatures start life as one sex and finish it as another. These sequential hermaphrodites come in many varieties. For instance, in protoandry an animal is first male and later female; proterogyny is the converse, with young females metamorphosing into functional males as they age. Or the process can be cyclical. Oysters are bom as males, then spend the rest of their lives switching back and forth between male and female in irregular cycles a few months long.

What would a society of sequential hermaphroditic aliens be like? We can take a few clues from the life history of the freshwater shrimp Gammarus pulex. Each of these individual crustaceans is both male and female, but not at the same time. Newborn animals spend early life in a neuter stage, after which they pass through puberty and enter the first sexually active phase as functioning males. After a while, the maleness is exhausted. Latent ovaries ripen into maturity, and the organism spends the remainder of its life as a full-fledged female. Eggs are shed by middle-aged mothers and are fertilized by energetic youthful males still in the middle of their first cycle.

It is a magnificent bisexual system, one which works quite well on Earth. No individual is excluded from any phase of the reproductive process. Still more significant, each member of the colony plays both male and female roles during his/her life. Drawing an analogy to the human life cycle, zoologist Norman J. Berrill of McGill University in Montreal imagines that all halfgrown individuals, about ten years old and weighing about 34 kilograms, would be males – the only males – ready to act as such both sexually and “probably in other wayward ways.” Like their truly human counterparts, as troublemakers they would be kept in line by a closed society of matriarchs, roughly equal in number to the males but each twice the size and much older and wiser. This wisdom would be not merely of a general character, as among human parents, but also in the special sense of each having been a male herself, as understanding as a mother with a child and as little likely to put up with any nonsense, perhaps wistfully looking back to her youthful manhood. Womanhood would bud as usual when masculinity had faded, with growth continuing and full female maturity yet to come.

The institution of monogamous marriage as we know it would be quite impossible in such a society. Husbands would be forever changing into wives and males would be too immature psychologically to be treated as other than “child-lovers.” Such pedophilia is viewed as a sexual perversion in many human societies, but for our intelligent shrimps it would seem quite normal. Incest prohibitions might be inordinately complex, since all fertile middle-aged females in the family in theory could mate with any or all male children. To offset the negative effects of inbreeding, exchanges of matriarchs could occur between families, doubtless accompanied by the same pomp and ceremony as upon “giving the bride away” in our society. Love in the traditional human sense probably would not exist – females could have strong affective and familial non-sexual ties with other females, whereas relations between females and males would be characterized more as controlling playfulness than by affectionate cooperation. Our usual concepts of male/female love might seem quite alien to them.

 

Xenogamy

Given these tremendous potential cultural and biological differences, one wonders if meaningful interspecies social-sexual relations would be possible at all between humans and extraterrestrials. Many science fiction authors have tried to deal sensibly with this touchy question, such as Philip Jose Farmer in The Lovers, in Flesh, and in Strange Relations, Walter Tevis in his The Man Who Fell to Earth, and a host of others. There have been “reports” of sexual molestations of humans by the occupants of UFOs. And Star Trek’s own Mr. Spock is a prime example of xenogamy, the product of a marriage between a human female alid a male alien from the fictional planet Vulcan.

It is not at all implausible that interspecies copulation can occur. Given the prevalence of the complementary male and female organs throughout the animal kingdom on this planet, such activity may indeed be possible even between creatures of “gross morphologic disparity.”[4] Alfred Kinsey’s researchers turned up accounts of attempted couplings between a female eland and an ostrich, a male dog and a chicken, a female chimpanzee and a tomcat, and a stallion and a human female. Obviously, relations between humans and other beings even roughly humanoid in shape can happen.

If such activity is possible, is it likely? Could humankind and an alien race derive sexual pleasure from mutual physical encounters? These are very difficult questions, mainly because the ET is such an unknown quantity. Extraterrestrials may have organs, appearances, sensitivities, and responses wholly incompatible with any conceivable human style of lovemaking.

And yet – in 1948 Kinsey reported that some 17 of all rural farmboys had experienced sexual congress with various barnyard animals, and had achieved orgasmic satisfaction in this way. (Less than a tenth of a percent of all females interviewed admitted such coition, although 1.5 of the sample reported some form of sexual contact with animals.) If bestiality occurs so regularly among human populations, can we state with any assurance that “xeniality” will not also occur when humans mingle socially with alien races? The evidence, scanty though it may be,suggests that interspecies sexual contacts are not only possible but probable.

One last question remains. When humans and aliens sexually join. will anything result from the union? Again, this is a difficult question because an unknown alien physiology is involved. Different species on Earth have been mated successfully from time to time – for instance, the hybrid offspring of a mallard and a pintail duck is fertile.

In 1975 a chance mating of two very different species of ape in the Grant Park Zoo produced the first reported ape hybrid. The offspring, dubbed a “siabon,” was the result of a mating between a male gibbon and a female siamang confined in a single cage. “Obviously,” remarked one researcher, “they had been sexually involved for some time.” Gibbon cells have 44 chromosomes, whereas siamang cells have 50, and thus are farther apart genetically than human beings and the great apes. The “siabon” offspring, believed sterile, has a mixed bag of 47 chromosomes – 22 from the father and 25 from the mother. Still, in the first analysis, xenobiologists recognize that interspecies fertilization, and especially hybrid fertility, is a rather rare phenomenon.

In the context of extraterrestrial matings, natural interspecies fertility should be even rarer. (Of course, with advanced technology almost anything may be possible – the first interkingdom clones combining plants and animals were achieved during the late 1970s.) We know that slight changes in the environment can cause enormous variations in planetary biochemistry. Nucleic acids, genes and codons may not be needed by ETs, or these may be essential but in different forms than are found on Earth. Many complicated and highly unlikely coincidences must occur for an alien/human mating to produce viable results. The two species must have identical amino acid sequences for proteins (assuming they even have proteins), the same optical rotation in their biomolecules, closely matched chromosomes with similar size and shape, the same kinds of genes located on the same chromosomes at the same locations, and so forth – all of which is highly improbable. It has not even been shown that humans can produce interspecies offspring with their own closest biological relatives – apes and other primates who share most of man’s biological heritage.

So interspecies matings involving humans aren’t likely to result in pregnancy. If pregnancy somehow does occur, the hybrid offspring probably won’t be viable. (It has been estimated that up to 50% of all normal human pregnancies may end in spontaneous abortion.) Finally, if somehow viable and carried to term, the interspecies hybrid will most likely be sterile or maladapted for natural survival, much like the mule or the liger. Hybrid vigor is unlikely in the offspring of parents of such widely varying genetic constitution.

• Recommended Links

Searching For Extraterrestrial Life Forms on Other Planets

Evidence of Life on Mars and Analysis of Evidence of Life On Mars

 

Can the Vacuum Be Engineered for Space Flight Applications? Overview of Theory and Experiments

Image via Wikipedia

By H. E. Puthoff

Quantum theory predicts, and experiments verify, that empty space (the vacuum) contains an enormous residual background energy known as zero-point energy (ZPE). Originally thought to be of significance only for such esoteric concerns as small perturbations to atomic emission processes, it is now known to play a role in large-scale phenomena of interest to technologists as well, such as the inhibition of spontaneous emission, the generation of short-range attractive forces (e.g., the Casimir force), and the possibility of accounting for sonoluminescence phenomena. ZPE topics of interest for spaceflight applications range from fundamental issues (where does inertia come from, can it be controlled?), through laboratory attempts toextract useful energy from vacuum fluctuations (can the ZPE be “mined” for practical use?), to scientifically grounded extrapolations concerning “engineering the vacuum” (is “warp-drive” space propulsion a scientific possibility?). Recent advances in research into the physics of the underlying  ZPE indicate the possibility of potential application in all these areas of interest.

The concept “engineering the vacuum” was first introduced by Nobel Laureate T. D. Lee  in his book Particle Physics and Introduction to Field Theory. As stated in Lee’s book: ” The experimental method to alter the properties of the vacuum may be called vacuum engineering…. If  indeed we are able to alter the vacuum, then we may encounter some new phenomena, totally unexpected.” Recent experiments have indeed shown this to be the case.

With regard  to space propulsion,  the question of engineering the vacuum can be put succinctly: ” Can empty space itself provide the solution?” Surprisingly enough, there are hints that potential help may in fact emerge quite literally out of the vacuum of so-called ” empty space.” Quantum theory  tells us that empty space is not truly empty, but rather is the seat of myriad energetic quantum processes  that  could have profound  implications  for  future  space travel. To understand these  implications it will serve us to review briefly the historical development of the scientific view of what constitutes empty space.

At the time of the Greek philosophers, Democritus argued that empty space was truly a void, otherwise there would not be room for the motion of atoms. Aristotle, on the other hand, argued equally forcefully that what appeared to be empty space was in fact a plenum (a background filled with substance), for did not heat and light travel from place to place as if carried by some kind of medium? The argument went back and forth through the centuries until finally codified by Maxwell’s  theory of  the  luminiferous  ether, a plenum  that  carried electromagnetic waves, including light, much as water carries waves across its surface. Attempts  to measure  the properties of  this ether, or to measure the Earth’s velocity through the ether (as in the Michelson-Morley experiment), however, met with failure. With the rise of special relativity which did not require reference to such an underlying substrate, Einstein in 1905 effectively banished the ether in favor of the concept that empty space constitutes a true void. Ten years later, however, Einstein’s own development of the general theory of relativity with its  concept of curved space and distorted geometry forced him to reverse his stand and opt for a richly-endowed plenum, under the new label spacetime metric.

It was the advent of modern quantum theory, however, that established the quantum vacuum, so-called empty space, as a very active place, with particlesarising and disappearing, a virtual plasma, and fields continuously fluctuatingabout their zero baseline values. The energy associated with such processes iscalled zero-point energy (ZPE), reflecting the fact that such activity remains even at absolute zero.

The Vacuum As A Potential Energy Source

At its most fundamental level, we now recognize that the quantum vacuum is an enormous reservoir of untapped energy, with energy densities conservatively estimated by Feynman and Hibbs to be on the order of nuclear energy densities or greater. Therefore, the question is, can the ZPE be “mined” for practical use? If so, it would constitute a virtually ubiquitous energy supply, a veritable “Holy Grail” energy source for space propulsion.

As utopian as such a possibility may seem, physicist Robert Forward at Hughes Research Laboratories demonstrated proof-of-principle in apaper,  “Extracting Electrical Energy from the Vacuum by Cohesion of Charged Foliated Conductors.” Forward’s approach exploited a phenomenon called the Casimir Effect, an attractive quantum force between closely-spaced metal plates, named for its discoverer, H. G. B. Casimir of Philips Laboratories in the Netherlands. The Casimir force, recently measured with high accuracy by S. K. Lamoreaux at the University of Washington, derives from partial shielding of  the interior region of the plates from the background zero-point fluctuations of the vacuum electromagnetic field. As shown by Los Alamos theorists Milonni  et  al., this shielding results in the plates being pushed together by the unbalanced ZPE radiation pressures. The result is a corollary conversion of vacuum energy to some other  form such as heat. Proof  that such a process violates neither energy nor  thermodynamic constraints can be found in a paper by a colleague and myself (Cole & Puthoff ) under the title “Extracting Energy and Heat from the Vacuum.”

Attempts to harness the Casimir and related effects for vacuum energy conversion are ongoing in our laboratory and elsewhere. The fact that its potential application to space propulsion has not gone unnoticed by the Air Force can be seen in its request for proposals for the FY-1986 Defense  SBIR Program. Under entry AF86-77, Air Force Rocket Propulsion  Laboratory (AFRPL), Topic: Non-Conventional Propulsion Concepts we f ind the statement: ” Bold,new non-conventional propulsion concepts are solicited…. The specific area sin which AFRPL is interested include…. (6) Esoteric  energy  sources  for propulsion  including  the zero point quantum dynamic energy of vacuum space.”

Several experimental formats for tapping the ZPE for practical use are under investigation in our laboratory. An early one of interest is based on the idea of a Casimir pinch effect in non-neutral plasmas, basically a plasma equivalent of Forward’s electromechanical charged-plate collapse. The underlying physics is described in a paper submitted for publication by myself and a colleague, and it is illustrative that the first of several patents issued to a consultant to our laboratory, K. R. Shoulders(1991), contains the descriptive phrase ” …energy  is provided… and the ultimate source of this energy appears to be the zero-point radiation of the vacuum continuum.” Another intriguing possibility is provided by the phenomenon of sonoluminescence, bubble collapse in an ultrasonically-driven fluid which is accompanied by intense, sub-nanosecond light radiation. Although the jury is still out as to the mechanism of light generation, Nobelist Julian Schwinger (1993) has argued for a Casimir interpretation. Possibly related experimental evidence for excess heat generation in ultrasonically-driven cavitation in heavy water is claimed in an EPRI Report by E-Quest Sciences ,although attributed to a nuclear micro-fusion process. Work is under way in our laboratory to see if this claim can be replicated.

Yet another proposal for ZPE extraction is described in a recent patent(Mead & Nachamkin, 1996). The approach proposes  the use of resonant dielectric spheres, slightly detuned from each other, to provide a beat-frequency downshift of the more energetic high-frequency components of the ZPE to a more easily captured form. We are discussing the possibility of a collaborative effort between us to determine whether such an approach is feasible. Finally, an approach utilizing micro-cavity techniques to perturb the ground state stability of atomic hydrogen is under consideration in our lab. It is based on a paper of mine (Puthoff, 1987) in which I put forth the hypothesis that then on radiative nature of the ground state  is due to a dynamic equilibrium in which radiation emitted due to accelerated electron ground state motion is compensated by absorption from the ZPE. If this hypothesis is true, there exists the potential for energy generation by the application of the techniques of so-called cavity quantum electrodynamics(QED). In cavity QED, excited atoms are passed through Casimir-like cavities whose structure suppresses electromagnetic cavity modes at the transition frequency between the atom’s excited and ground states. The result is that the so-called “spontaneous” emission time is lengthened considerably (for example, by factors of ten), simply because spontaneous emission is not so spontaneous after all, but rather is driven by vacuum fluctuations. Eliminate the modes, and you eliminate the zero point fluctuations of the modes, hence suppressing decay of the excited state. As stated in a review article on cavity QED in Scientific American, “An excited atom that would ordinarily emit a low-frequency photon can not do so, because there are no vacuum fluctuations to stimulate its emission….In its application to energy generation, mode suppression would be used to perturb the hypothesized dynamic ground state absorption/emission balance to lead to energy release.

An example in which Nature herself may have taken advantage of energetic vacuum effects is discussed in a model published by ZPE colleagues A. Rueda of California State University at Long Beach, B. Haisch of Lockheed-Martin,and D. Cole of IBM (1995). In a paper published in the Astrophysical Journal,they propose that the vast reaches of outer space constitute an ideal environment for ZPE acceleration of nuclei and thus provide a mechanism for “powering up” cosmic rays. Details of the model would appear to account for other observed phenomena as well, such as the formation of cosmic voids. This raises the possibility of utilizing a ” sub-cosmic-ray” approach to accelerate protons in a cryogenically-cooled, collision-free vacuum trap and thus extract energy from the vacuum fluctuations by this mechanism.

The Vacuum as the Source of Gravity and Inertia

What of the fundamental forces of gravity and inertia that we seek to overcome in space travel? We have phenomenological theories that describe their effects(Newton’s Laws and their relativistic generalizations), but what of their origins?

The first hint that these phenomena might themselves be traceable to roots in the underlying fluctuations of the vacuum came in a study published by the well-known Russian physicist Andrei Sakharov. Searching to derive Einstein’s phenomenological equations for general relativity from a more fundamental set of assumptions, Sakharov came to the conclusion that the entire panoply of general relativistic phenomena could be seen as induced effects brought about by changes  in the quantum-fluctuation energy of the vacuum due to the presence of matter. In this view the attractive gravitational force is more akin to the induced Casimir force discussed above, than to the fundamental inverse square law Coulomb force between charged particles with which it is often compared. Although speculative when first introduced by Sakharov this hypothesis has led to a rich and ongoing literature, including contributions of my own on quantum-fluctuation-induced gravity, aliterature that continues to yield deep insight into the role played by vacuum forces.

Given an apparent deep connection between gravity and the zero-point fluctuations of the vacuum, a similar connection must exist between these self same vacuum fluctuations and inertia. This is because it is an empirical fact that the gravitational and inertial masses have the same value, even though the underlying phenomena are quite disparate. Why, for example, should a measure of the resistance of a body to being accelerated, even if far from any gravitational  field, have the same value that  is associated with the gravitational attraction between bodies? Indeed, if one is determined by vacuum fluctuations, so must the other. To get to the heart of inertia, consider a specific example in which you are standing on a train in the station. As the train leaves the platform with a jolt, you could be thrown to the  floor. What  is  this force  that knocks you down,seemingly coming out of nowhere? This phenomenon, which we conveniently label inertia and go on about our physics, is a subtle feature of the universe that has perplexed generations of physicists from Newton to Einstein. Since in this example the sudden disquieting imbalance results from acceleration “relative to the fixed stars,” in its most provocative  form one could say that it was the “stars” that delivered the punch. This key feature was emphasized by the Austrian philosopher of science Ernst Mach, and is now known as Mach’s Principle. Nonetheless, the mechanism by which the stars might do this deed has eluded convincing explication.

Addressing this issue in a paper entitled “Inertia as a Zero-Point Field Lorentz Force,” my colleagues and I (Haisch, Rueda & Puthoff, 1994) were successful in tracing the problem of inertia and its connection to Mach’s Principle to the ZPE properties of the vacuum. In a sentence, although a uniformly moving body does not experience a drag  force from  the  (Lorentz-invariant)vacuum fluctuations, an accelerated body meets a resistance (force) proportional to the acceleration. By accelerated we mean, of course, accelerated relative to the fixed stars. It turns out that an argument can be made that the quantum fluctuations of distant matter structure the local vacuum-fluctuation frame of reference. Thus, in the example of the train the punch was delivered by the wall of vacuum fluctuations acting as a proxy for the fixed stars through which one attempted to accelerate.

The implication for space travel is this: Given the evidence generated in the field of cavity QED (discussed above), there is experimental evidence that vacuum  fluctuations can be altered by technological means. This leads to the corollary that, in principle, gravitational and inertial masses can also be altered. The possibility of altering mass with a view to easing the energy burden of future spaceships has been seriously considered by the Advanced Concepts Office of the Propulsion Directorate of the Phillips Laboratory at Edwards AirForce Base. Gravity researcher Robert Forward accepted an assignment to review this concept. His deliverable product was to recommend a broad, multipronged ef fort involving laboratories from around the world to investigate the inertia model experimentally. The Abstract reads in part:

Many researchers see the vacuum as a central ingredient of 21st-Century physics ….Some even believe the vacuum may be harnessed to provide a limitless supply of energy. This report summarizes an attempt to find an experiment that would test the Haisch,Rueda and Puthoff (HRP) conjecture that the mass and inertia of a body are induced effects brought about by changes in the quantum-fluctuation energy of the vacuum…. It was possible to find an experiment that might be able to prove or disprove that the inertial mass of a body can be altered by making changes in the vacuum surrounding the body.

With regard to action items, Forward in fact recommends a ranked list of not one but four experiments to be carried out to address the ZPE-inertia conceptand its broad implications. The recommendations included investigation of the proposed “sub-cosmic-ray energy device” mentioned earlier, and the investigation of an hypothesized “inertia-wind” effect proposed by our laboratory and possibly detected in early experimental work,though the latter possibility is highly speculative at this point.

Engineering the Vacuum For “Warp Drive”

Perhaps one of the most speculative, but nonetheless scientifically-grounded, proposals of all is the so-called Alcubierre Warp Drive. Taking on the challenge of determining whether Warp Drive a là Star Trek was a scientific possibility, general relativity theorist Miguel Alcubierre of the University of  Wales set himself  the task of determining whether faster-than light travel was possible within the constraints of standard theory. Although such clearly could not be the case in the flat space of special relativity, general relativity permits consideration of altered space time metrics where such a possibility is not a priori ruled out. Alcubierre ’s further self-imposed constraints on an acceptable solution included the requirements that no net time distortion should occur (breakfast on Earth, lunch on Alpha Centauri, and home for dinner with your wife and children, not your great-great-great grandchildren), and that the occupants of the spaceship were not to be flattened against the bulkhead by unconscionable accelerations.

A solution meeting all of the above requirements was found and published by Alcubierre in Classical and Quantum Gravity in 1994. The solution discovered by Alcubierre involved the creation of a local distortion of space time such that space time is expanded behind the spaceship, contracted ahead of it, and yields a hypersurfer-like motion faster than the speed of light as seen by observers outside the disturbed region. In essence, on the outgoing leg of its journey the spaceship is pushed away from Earth and pulled towards its distant destination by the engineered local expansion of space time itself. For followup on the broader aspects of “metric engineering” concepts, one can refer to apaper published  by myself  in Physics Essays (Puthoff,  1996). Interestingly enough, the engineering requirements rely on the generation of macroscopic,negative-energy-density, Casimir-like states in the quantum vacuum of the type discussed earlier. Unfortunately,meeting such requirements is beyond technological reach without some unforeseen breakthrough.

Related, of course, is the knowledge that general relativity permits the possibility of wormholes, topological tunnels which in principle could connect distant parts of the universe, a cosmic subway so to speak. Publishing in the American Journal of Physics, theorists Morris and Thorne initially outlined in some detail the requirements for traversible wormholes and have found that, in principle, the possibility exists provided one has access to Casimir-like, negative-energy-density quantum vacuum states. This has led to a rich literature, summarized recently in a book by Matt Visser of Washington University. Again, the technological requirements appear out of reach for the foreseeable future, perhaps awaiting new techniques for cohering the ZPE vacuum fluctuations in order to meet the energy-density requirements.

Where does this leave us? As we peer into the heavens from the depth of our gravity well, hoping for some “magic” solution that will launch our spacefarers first to the planets and then to the stars, we are reminded of Arthur C. Clarke’s phrase that highly-advanced technology is essentially indistinguishable from magic. Fortunately, such magic appears to be waiting in the wings of our deepening understanding of the quantum vacuum in which we live.

[Ad: Can the Vacuum Be Engineered for Space Flight Applications? Overview of  Theory and Experiments By H. E. Puthoff(PDF)]

Negative Energy: From Theory to Lab

Image via Wikipedia

Space time distortion is common method proposed for hyperluminal travel. Such space-time contortions would enable another staple of science fiction as well: faster-than-light travel.Warp drive might appear to violate Einstein’s special theory of relativity. But special relativity says that you cannot outrun a light signal in a fair race in which you and the signal follow the same route. When space-time is warped, it might be possible to beat a light signal by taking a different route, a shortcut. The contraction of space-time in front of the bubble and the expansion behind it create such a shortcut.
One problem with Alcubierre’s original model that the interior of the warp bubble is causally disconnected from its forward edge. A starship captain on the inside cannot steer the bubble or turn it on or off; some external agency must set it up ahead of time. To get around this problem, Krasnikov proposed a “superluminal subway,” a tube of modified space-time (not the same as a wormhole) connecting Earth and a distant star. Within the tube, superluminal travel in one direction is possible. During the outbound journey at sublight speed, a spaceship crew would create such a tube. On the return journey, they could travel through it at warp speed. Like warp bubbles, the subway involves negative energy.

Almost every faster than light travel requires negative energies to be implemented at a very large densities. Today I came across a paper by E. W. Devis in which he described various experimental conditions under which negative energy can be generated in lab.

Examples of Exotic or “Negative” Energy

The exotic (energy condition-violating) mass-energy fields that are known to occur in nature are:� Radial electric or magnetic fields.

• Radial electric or magnetic fields. These are borderline exotic, if their tension were infinitesimally larger,for a given energy density.�
• Squeezed quantum states of the electromagnetic field and other squeezed quantum fields;
• Gravitationally squeezed vacuum electromagnetic zero-point energy.
• Other quantum fields/states/effects. In general, the local energy density in quantum field theory can benegative due to quantum coherence effects. Other examples that have been studied are Dirac field states: the superposition of two single particle electron states and thesuperposition of two multi-electron-positron states. In the former(latter), the energy densities can be negative when two single (multi-) particle states have the same number of electrons (electrons and positrons) or when one state has one more electron (electron-positron pair) than the other.

Since the laws of quantum field theory place no strong restrictions on negative energies and fluxes, then it might bepossible to produce gross macroscopic effects such as warp drive, traversable wormholes, violation of the second law of thermodynamics, and time machines. The above examples are representative forms of mass-energy that possess negativeenergy density or are borderline exotic.

Generating Negative Energy in Lab

Davis and Puthoff described various experiment to generate and detect negative energy in lab. Some of them are as:

1. Squeezed Quantum States: Substantial theoretical and experimental work has shown that in many quantum systems the limits to measurementprecision imposed by the quantum vacuum zero-point fluctuations (ZPF) can be breached by decreasing the noise inone observable (or measurable quantity) at the expense of increasing the noise in the conjugate observable; at thesame time the variations in the first observable, say the energy, are reduced below the ZPF such that the energybecomes “negative.” “Squeezing” is thus the control of quantum fluctuations and corresponding uncertainties,whereby one can squeeze the variance of one (physically important) observable quantity provided the variance in the(physically unimportant) conjugate variable is stretched/increased. The squeezed quantity possesses an unusuallylow variance, meaning less variance than would be expected on the basis of the equipartition theorem. One can inprinciple exploit quantum squeezing to extract energy from one place in the ordinary vacuum at the expense ofaccumulating excess energy elsewhere.

2. Gravitationally Squeezed Electromagnetic ZPF: A natural source of negative energy comes from the effect that gravitational fields (of astronomical bodies) in space have upon the surrounding vacuum. For example, the gravitational field of the Earth produces a zone of negative energy around it by dragging some of the virtual particle pairs (a.k.a. vacuum ZPF) downward. One can utilize the negative vacuum energy densities, which arise from distortion of the electromagnetic zero point fluctuations due to the interaction with a prescribed gravitational background, for providing a violation of the energy conditions. The squeezed quantum states of quantum optics provide a natural form of matter having negative energy density. The analysis, via quantum optics, shows that gravitation itself provides the mechanism for generating the squeezed vacuum states needed to support stable traversable wormholes. The production of negative energy densities via a squeezed vacuum is a necessary and unavoidable consequence of the interaction or coupling between ordinary matter and gravity, and this defines what is meant by gravitationally squeezed vacuum states.

The general result of the gravitational squeezing effect is that as the gravitational field strength increases, thenegative energy zone (surrounding the mass) also increases in strength. Table  shows when gravitational squeezing becomes important for example masses. The table shows that in the case of the Earth, Jupiter and the Sun, this squeeze effect is extremely feeble because only ZPF mode wavelengths above 0.2 m – 78 km are affected. For asolar mass black hole (radius of 2.95 km), the effect is still feeble because only ZPF mode wavelengths above 78 kmare affected. But also note in the table that Planck mass objects will have an enormously strong negative energyzone surrounding them because all ZPF mode wavelengths above 8.50* 10^-34 meters will be squeezed, in otherwords, all wavelengths of interest for vacuum fluctuations. Protons will have the strongest negative energy zone incomparison because the squeezing effect includes all ZPF mode wavelengths above 6.50* 10^-53 meters. Furthermore, a body smaller than a nuclear diameter (≈ 10^-16 m) and containing the mass of a mountain (≈10^11 kg)has a fairly strong negative energy zone because all ZPF mode wavelengths above 10􀀐15 meters will be squeezed.

We are presently unaware of any way to artificially generate gravitational squeezing of the vacuum in the laboratory. This will be left for future investigation. Aliens may help us!!

3. A Moving Mirror: Negative energy can be created by a single moving reflecting surface (a moving mirror). A mirror moving with increasing acceleration generates a flux of negative energy that emanates from its surface and flows out into the space ahead of the mirror. However, this effect is known to beexceedingly small, and it is not the most effective way to generate negative energy for our purposes.

4.Radial Electric/Magnetic Fields: It is beyond the scope to include all the technical configurations by which one can generate radialelectric or magnetic fields. Suffice it to say that ultrahigh-intensity table top lasers have been used to generate extreme electric and magnetic field strengths in the lab. Ultrahigh-intensity lasers use the chirped-pulse amplification (CPA) technique to boost the total output beam power. All laser systems simply repackage energy asa coherent package of optical power, but CPA lasers repackage the laser pulse itself during the amplification process. In typical high-power short-pulse laser systems, it is the peak intensity, not the energy or the fluence,which causes pulse distortion or laser damage. However, the CPA laser dissects a laser pulse according to itsfrequency components, and reorders it into a time-stretched lower-peak-intensity pulse of the same energy. This benign pulse can then be amplified safely to high energy, andthen only afterwards reconstituted as a very short pulse of enormous peak power – a pulse which could never itselfhave passed safely through the laser system (see Figure 2). Made more tractable in this way, the pulse can be amplified to substantial energies (with orders of magnitude greater peak power) without encountering intensity related problems.

The extreme output beam power, fields and physical conditions that have been achieved by ultrahigh-intensitytabletop lasers are:

• Power Intensity 10^15 – 10^26 Watts/cm2 (10^30 W/cm2 using SLAC as a booster)
• Peak Power Pulse ≤10^3 femtoseconds
• E-fields ≈10^14 – 10^18 V/m [note: the critical quantum-electrodynamical (vacuum breakdown) field strengthis Ec = 2me^2c^3/he =10^18 V/m; me and e are the electron mass and charge]
• B-fields ≈ several ≈10^6 Tesla [note: the critical quantum-electrodynamical (vacuum breakdown) field strength is Bc = Ec/c =10^10 Tesla]
• Ponderomotive Acceleration of  Electrons ≈10^17 – 10^30 g’s (1 g = 9.81 m/sec2)
• Light Pressure ≈10^9 – 10^15 bars
• Plasma Temperatures > 10^10 K

Ultrahigh-intensity lasers can generate an electric field energy density of ~ 10^16 –10^28 J/m^3 and a magnetic field energy density of ~ 10^19 J/m^3. These energy densities are about the right order ofmagnitude to explore generating kilometer to AU sized wormholes. But that would be difficult to engineer on Earth. However, these energy densities are well above what would be required to explore the generation of micro wormholes in the lab.

5. Negative Energy from Squeezed Light: Negative energy can be generated by an array of ultrahigh intensity (femtosecond) lasers using an ultrafast rotatingmirror system. In this scheme  a laser beam is passed through an optical cavity resonator made of  lithium niobate (LiNbO3) crystal that is shaped like a cylinder with rounded silvered ends toreflect light. The resonator will act to produce a secondary lower frequency light beam in which the pattern ofphotons is rearranged into pairs. This is the quantum optical squeezing of light effect that we described previously.Therefore, the squeezed light beam emerging from the resonator will contain pulses of negative energy interspersedwith pulses of positive energy in accordance with the quantum squeezing model.

In this example both the negative and positive energy pulses are of ≈10^-15 second duration. We could arrange a setof rapidly rotating mirrors to separate the positive and negative energy pulses from each other. The light beam is tostrike each mirror surface at a very shallow angle while the rotation ensures that the negative energy pulses are reflected at a slightly different angle from the positive energy pulses. A small spatial separation of the two differentenergy pulses will occur at some distance from the rotating mirror. Another system of mirrors will be needed toredirect the negative energy pulses to an isolated location and concentrate them there. The rotating mirror system can actually be implemented via non-mechanical means.

Negative Energy Pulses Generated from Quantum Optical Squeezing. No other way to squeeze light would be to manufacture extremely reliable light pulses containing precisely one, two,or the squeezed (electromagnetic) vacuum state, the energy density is given by: placed within the squeezing cavity, and a laser beam is directed through the gas. The beam is reflected back onitself by a mirror to form a standing wave within the sodium chamber. This wave causes rapid variations in theoptical properties of the sodium thus causing rapid variations in the squeezed light so that we can induce rapid reflections of pulses by careful design.

On another note, when a quantum state is close to a squeezed vacuum state, there will almost always be some negative energy densities present, and the fluctuations in start to become nearly as large as the expectation value itself.

Observing Negative Energy in Lab:

Negative energy should be observable in lab experiments. The negative energy regions in space  is predicted to produce a unique signature corresponding to lensing, chromaticity and intensity effects in micro- and macro-lensing events on galactic and extragalactic/cosmological scales. It has been shown that these effects provide a specific signature that allows for discrimination between ordinary (positive mass-energy) and negative mass energy lenses via the spectral analysis of astronomical lensing events. Theoretical modeling of negative energylensing effects has led to intense astronomical searches for naturally occurring traversable wormholes in the universe. Computer model simulations and comparison of their results with recent satellite observations of gamma ray bursts (GRBs) has shown that putative negative energy (i.e., traversable wormhole)lensing events very closely resembles the main features of some GRBs. Current observational data suggests that large amounts of naturally occurring “exotic mass-energy” must have existed sometime between the epoch of galaxy formation and the present in order to (properly) quantitatively account for the“age-of-the-oldest-stars-in-the-galactic halo” problem and the cosmological evolution parameters.

When background light rays strike a negative energy lensing region, they are swept out of  the central region thus creating an umbra region of zero intensity. At the edges of the umbra the rays accumulate and create a rainbow-like caustic with enhanced light intensity. The lensing of a negative mass-energy region is not analogous to a diverging lens because in certain circumstances it can produce more light enhancement than does the lensing of an equivalent positive mass-energy region. Real background sources in lensing events can have non-uniform brightness distributions on their surfaces and a dependency of their emission with the observing frequency. These complications can result in chromaticity effects, i.e. in spectral changes induced by differential lensing during the event. The modeling of such effects is quite lengthy, somewhat model dependent, and with recent application only to astronomical lensing events. Suffice it to say that future work is necessary to scale down the predicted lensing parameters and characterize their effects for lab experiments in which the negative energy will not be of astronomical magnitude. Present ultrahigh-speed optics and optical cavities, lasers, photonic crystal (and switching)technology, sensitive nano-sensor technology, and other techniques are very likely capable of detecting the very small magnitude lensing effects expected in lab experiments.

Thus, it can be concluded as fact that negative energy can be generated in lab and will be no more referred as mere ‘fiction’. In a recent work it was suggested that naturally occurring wormholes can be detected since they attract charged particles which in turn, creates magnetic field. Well, I’ll review it and would present a model for realistic Warp Drive’.

[REF: Experimental Concepts for Generating Negative Energy in the Laboratory BY E. W. Devis and H. E. Puthoff]

Differential Survival Across the K‐T Boundary – Why the Non‐Avian Dinosaur Eggs Didn’t Hatch, and the Reptile and Bird Eggs Did

Image via Wikipedia

By Victor Babbitt

Extinction in itself is, throughout geologic history, the norm rather than the exception.  The fact that many species perished in the aftermath of the many environmental calamities that occurred around 65 million years ago, (the Chicxulub asteroid impact and Deccan Volcanism) is hardly surprising.  The real question has always been the differential survival of species.  Dinosaurs were the dominant land animals for over 100 million years, the dominant herbivores, the dominant predators, ranging from chicken size to the largest land animals that ever lived, adapted to every environment, and living on every continent from pole to pole.  The question of  how this dominance ended is important, as it is fully possible that without this extinction, dinosaurs would still rule the earth, and mammals might still be rat sized animals rustling through the underbrush.

In the article, we argue that the global cooling period lasting from years to decades caused by the injection of SO2 from either asteriod impact or Deccan Volcanism differentially affected the hatching of dinosaur eggs as opposed to reptile and bird eggs.    We attempt to show that a global cooling of a few decades could have created a ‘dead generation’, where many reptile and bird eggs would still hatch, but dinosaur eggs would not, wiping out a 100 million years of dominance in a single generation.   We will examine data on the differing effects of cold on reptile and bird eggs today, along with dinosaur nesting behaviors and the stable Cretaceous climate.

It turns out the developmental temperature requirements for reptile and birds eggs are quite different.  Given the assumption that dinosaur eggs had similar developmental requirements to bird eggs, dinosaur eggs not incubated by body contact, and subjected to a global cooling of ~10C would result in dinosaur eggs that never hatched, while mammals, reptiles and amphibians would continue to reproduce.  Such a global cooling period is a predicted effect of both the  Chicxulub asteroid impact and Deccan Volcanism.  Avian dinosaurs (birds) that had evolved incubation by direct body contact would also have reproduced and survived.

A New Theory on Why the Dinosaurs Perished but Reptiles, Birds, Mammals and Amphibians Did Not

Probably no scientific mystery has captured the public imagination as broadly as the extinction of the dinosaurs. However, as many scientists have noted, the mystery isn’t so much why the dinosaurs disappeared, but rather why did other species survive? Why did every single one of the hundreds of species of dinosaurs, who were the dominant land animals for more than 100 million years, suddenly disappear about 65 million years ago, while many mammals, reptiles, birds, and amphibians survived?

Research conducted in the last few decades, while not answering the mystery of extinction, has shown a light on many issues around dinosaurs and their extinction. In one sense, all the dinosaurs did not disappear. Most researchers believe that one member of the Dinosaur family is still with us, in the shape of birds. We now know that two enormous events occurred near 65 million years ago that caused powerful environmental effects. One was an asteroid impact that occurred near present day Chicxulub, Mexico, where a ~10 km asteroid impacted the earth, and the other was Deccan volcanism, where much of modern‐day India was covered with lava. Both events are theorized to have caused short term global cooling by the injection of gigatons of  SO2 into the atmosphere. Other important research has hypothesized dinosaurs being endothermic, or ‘hot blooded’ animals as opposed to exothermic animals such as reptiles and amphibians; and many thousands of fossilized dinosaur eggs have been analyzed, giving us insight into dinosaur nesting behaviors.

However, the main question still eludes us. While the effects of the Chicxulub impact and Deccan volcanism decimated many animals, why did all the non‐avian dinosaurs, numerous and successful around the world from the equator to the polar regions, all die out while many previously less numerous and successful species survived? The answer we propose is that the global cooling period lasting from years to decades caused by injection of  SO2 into the atmosphere by either the Chicxulub impact or Deccan volcanism differentially affected the hatching of dinosaur eggs as opposed to reptile and bird eggs. We intend to show that a global cooling of a few decades could have created a ‘dead generation’, where many reptile and bird eggs would still hatch, but dinosaur eggs would not, wiping out a 100 million years of dominance in a single generation. We will examine data on the differing effects of cold on reptile and bird eggs today, along with dinosaur nesting behaviors and the stable Cretaceous climate.

Dinosaur Extinction

Numerous theories have been suggested for the demise of the dinosaurs, from the well accepted theories of an asteroid based cataclysm, massive volcanic eruptions or a more gradual climactic change; to the less accepted theories of disease, dinosaur stress, and egg‐eating mammals. In March of 2010, 41 scientists meeting at the University of Cambridge agreed, after a comprehensive review of the evidence, that the Chicxulub asteroid impact caused the K‐T boundary mass extinction event.  They state that the impact effects could have included “extended darkness, global cooling and acid rain”. However, many other scientists believe the primary culprit was the Deccan volcanism. Aside from the severe environmental effects of the volcanism, they note that earlier asteroid impacts on the scale of the Chicxulub impact do not seem to relate to known extinctions. [33]However, both events are believed to have injected gigatons of  SO2 into the atmosphere, where the SO2 would be converted to sulfate aerosols, causing short term global cooling periods that lasted for years to decades. [17] [18] [33] [34]

Cretaceous Weather Global Forecast: Warm, Same as Yesterday

The entire Mesozoic era was characterized by a complete lack of polar ice caps, an average temperature warmer than today, and a remarkably even temperature gradient from pole to pole. In contrast to the varied global climates of today, much of the planet enjoyed a similar climate. The poles, for example, were 50C (90F) warmer than today. In particular, the Cretaceous is often characterized as a ‘greenhouse climate’, where global temperatures were much more uniform than today, and only 25C separated average polar temperatures from those at the equator [6] [7] .

Dinosaurs (but interestingly not exothermic reptiles and amphibians) and deciduous forests were abundant at latitudes close to both North and South poles, latitudes today that are covered by either mile‐thick glaciers or perennial sea ice. While the question of how the dinosaurs adapted to months of darkness is still a controversial area of research today, summer months at high latitudes were characterized by warm temperatures, and of course 24 hour sunlight.

Global Weather Forecast 65 million BC: Pack that Winter Coat

The stable, warm, pole to pole climate that dinosaurs had enjoyed for the previous 150 million years was abruptly interrupted at some time around 65 millions years ago. The Chicxulub asteroid impact released an estimated 200 gigatons each of sulfur dioxide and water into the atmosphere, resulting in the production of sulfate aerosols that cooled the planet globally by perhaps 10C for years to decades. Pope [17] noted “global average surface temperatures probably dropped between 5° and 31°K, suggesting that global near‐freezing conditions may have been reached”. [17] [18]

However, the short, sharp, cooling caused by the asteroid impact may have been predated by eruptions of SO2 caused by the Deccan volcanism. Self [34] estimates that each of the 30 largest Deccan volcanic eruptions injected up to 150 gigatons of SO2, perhaps in such close succession that multiple years‐long cooling periods would overlap. [33]

Not All Eggs Are the Same

Today most bird species incubate their eggs, keeping them warm by direct body contact. This allows the eggs to reach the internal temperature required for the embryo to develop. While some species leave the nest for several hours at a time to forage for food, they return to incubate the eggs daily, and particularly to keep them warm during the nighttime hours.The only exceptions to this are birds that have found strategies that allow their eggs to incubate in warm, stable environments suitable for the narrow range of temperature required for bird egg incubation without brooding them. The brush turkey and other birds of the family Megapodiidae build huge mound nests made of earth and organic debris. The eggs are hatched by the heat of the composting mound which is tended only by the males who regulate the temperature carefully such that the eggs stay within a 33‐35°C incubation window. [19]

How does temperature affect hatching success in bird eggs? Joint research was conducted by the University of California and US Department of Agriculture [4] on the viability of avian eggs removed from their nests for periods of time prior to return and proper incubation. It was found that the minimum temperature the eggs experienced had a strong affect on their hatch rate. The hatch rate on eggs not incubated for 7 days was just 2.1%, and the temperatures never reached below 15C (59F) on any day, and much higher on most days. In any case, the developmental zero for avian eggs, being the temperature at which no development of the embryo can take place, is generally considered to be 24C‐26C (75F‐79F) [5].

Not all eggs are the same. Exothermic (cold blooded) reptile eggs are much more resilient to temperature changes than bird eggs. Eggs of many reptile species can tolerate temperatures well below the developmental zero, indeed, some can withstand temperatures close to freezing [10]. Experiments with the lizard Bassiana duperreyi that involved moving eggs to cooler regimes where overnight temperatures dropped to 0C resulted in “only a relatively short delay in hatching”. [11]. Eggs of the turtle chelydra serpentina can survive a couple of weeks at 10C, and go on to develop normally. [22]

Not only can reptile eggs survive low minimum temperatures, but their developmental zero temperature is much lower than that exhibited by bird eggs. Developmental zero temperatures for the lizards B. duperreyi and T. septentrionalis are estimated to be 14.2C (57F), and 16.0C for the turtle P. sinensis. [12]

The temperature requirements for incubation of eggs, which relate to the underlying reproductive and physiological processes of the animal (e.g.; endothermic or exothermic) seem to be little changed by evolution. Although birds have radiated over many millions of years to environments that vary from the steamiest jungles to the Antarctic, the requirements for egg incubation have apparently changed only little. Drent notes that for 25 varied bird species measured, incubation temperatures varied from 34C‐38C (93F‐100F), with most species incubating between 35C‐36C. The coldest known incubation for any bird is for the emperor penguin, which incubates its eggs at 31C (89F) in environments that are ‐60F. [20] [21]

In addition, while avian eggs must begin incubation within several days of laying, reptiles may delay egg development after laying by several months. Díaz‐Paniagua subjected chameleon eggs to initial low temperatures of 14C for up to 149 days, and still observed a hatching success of 96.4%. In an experiment that could replicate the effect of a 5C drop in average temperature following the Chicxulub impact, Qualls and Andrews subjected the eggs of the mountain lizard Sceloporus Virgatus to a 15C to 20C diurnal nesting temperatures, instead of its normal 20C to 25C diurnal nesting temperatures. The result was the hatch rate reduced from 94% to 82%, and the incubation period increased, but many viable lizards were produced. [23] [24]

Dinosaurs Nesting Behavior

Most dinosaurs could not have incubated their eggs by direct body contact. Certainly the idea of huge Cretaceous dinosaurs such as Tyrannosaurus Rex or Titanosaurus sitting lightly on a clutch of eggs is only fit for Gary Larson cartoons. It has been suggested that small dinosaurs such as Oviraptor may have incubated eggs, as several skeletons have been found associated with clutches of eggs. However, given the positions of the egg clutches, it is unlikely Oviraptor was brooding eggs similar to birds, as few of the eggs could have been in the direct contact with the body. It is more likely that Oviraptor was guarding the eggs from marauding predators. [25]

While many scientists have theorized that dinosaur eggs were laid in the open, in small depressions or ditches, this would have left them open to predation unless guarded constantly by a parent. Deeming has analyzed pore areas on dinosaur eggshells, and concluded that the large pore area must reflect an environment of very high humidity, and suggests that dinosaurs buried their eggs in mounds of earth or organic material. [26]

Why the Birds, Reptiles, Amphibians and Mammals Survived, but the Non‐Avian Dinosaurs Did Not

A global cooling of ~10C for a few decades caused by either asteroid impact or Deccan volcanism, as is well within present predictions, would have a highly differential effect on survival between mammals, reptiles, amphibians and dinosaurs if we make the following assumptions: 1) late Cretaceous birds had developed incubation of eggs by direct body contact, and 2) non‐avian dinosaurs had egg developmental temperature requirements similar to avian dinosaurs. Dinosaurs had 150 million years of unchanging, steady, and remarkably even temperatures across the globe. Non‐avian dinosaur eggs with evolved incubation temperature requirements similar to present birds would have experienced regular hatching success, even at very high latitudes, so long as eggs were laid in the warm season. Whether laid in the open, or in nesting mounds, the long summer days of 30C and higher temperatures would assure a reasonable hatch rate.

A sudden drop in temperature from 30C to 20C average temperatures, while not fatal to the dinosaurs themselves, would have been catastrophic to their eggs. For season after season, dinosaurs would have guarded cold clutches of eggs, never hatching, to finally see them decay or be eaten by scavengers. The eggs either having been killed by minimum temperatures, or never having reached developmental incubation temperatures for sufficient time. If the global cooling period was short enough, perhaps a few aging mothers finally, after years, saw their progeny emerge from their eggs, only for the youngsters to be unable to find mates in the land decimated by effects of asteroid impact or extreme volcanism. If the cooling period was long enough, the dinosaurs that were young on the day of the impact would fight, grow old, and finally fall without ever having seen a new hatchling emerge. Dinosaurs, the undisputed masters of the earth for 100 million years, were extinguished by a few decades of cold weather.

With the exception of the birds, of course; why did birds develop incubation by direct body contact? Perhaps brooding evolved because the relatively small size of their egg would subject the egg to more degradation from thermal changes than their larger cousins, and body heat incubation would help insure a good hatch rate. Perhaps avoiding predators by nesting in trees resulted in nests that forced the bird, if it were to protect the eggs, to literally sit on the eggs. Bird nests made of grass or other organic debris would have provided insulation from the surrounding cold earth, making incubation by body contact all that more effective. Dinosaur eggs partially buried in earth substrate would have perished, even if partially incubated by body contact, as the surrounding soil temperature plummeted. Dinosaur eggs buried in mounds of earth or organic material would also perish as the chill from the surrounding environment cooled the mounds.

The same catastrophe would not occur for turtles, crocodiles, lizards, snakes and other reptiles following the asteroid impact. So long as the cooling was not very severe (> 20C), the sudden cooling would have probably reduced hatch rates, and increased time to hatch, and perhaps reduced the viability of the hatched offspring, but hatched offspring would occur. In addition, the lower metabolic requirements for exothermic reptiles would have been a key survival trait in the post‐impact desolation. Some present day snakes have been known to survive a year without eating.

In a dark and cold world, the reproductive strategy of mammals would be a distinct advantage, with progeny being incubated internally, and then nursed next to the warm mother’s body. The global cooling would have no effect in itself on reproduction. The remaining egg laying mammals, the Monotremes, are a case in point. Of the two remaining species, the echidnas possess a separate pouch where they incubate their eggs and nurse their young, while the egg of the platypus spends about 28 days in the uterus, and only 10 days in warm external incubation. The global cooling could perhaps also help explain why many more placental mammal species survived the K‐T boundary extinction than marsupial mammal species. Marsupials at birth are tiny, wet, hairless things that must make the long journey up their mother’s body to the pouch, a journey that takes 3 to 5 minutes for a kangaroo joey. For a newborn Virginia Opposum, which weighs only 1/10th of a gram, so small that dozens can fit in a teaspoon, perhaps the journey in a cold environment was too much for some.

Other Theories Exploring Differential Survival across the KT Boundary

The list of theories attempting to explain the extinction of the dinosaurs is long and often silly. Many catastrophes that might befall the dinosaurs have been dreamed of, but most fail to answer the more important question, why did some survive? Alvarez [27] writes, ‘‘Many smaller land animals survived, including mammals, as well as reptiles such as crocodiles and turtles. No one really understands why these animals escaped extinction.’’ While Powell [28] notes, ‘‘No one has yet been able to explain under any theory why the crocodiles and turtles survived and the dinosaurs did not”.

One serious attempt to answer this question was made by Robertson, who argues that ballistically reentering ejecta from the Chicxulub impact caused an intense infrared radiation pulse in the sky ‘‘of the order of 10 kW / square meter over periods ranging from one to several hours after the impact. These power levels are comparable to those obtained in a domesticoven set at broil”. Robertson further argues that this IR pulse might kill any unsheltered animal, and given the potential sheltering characteristics of small mammals and potentially turtles and other small creatures, the differential character of the extinctions might be explained. [29]

Since Robertson’s paper, the strength of this IR pulse has been questioned [30], and evidence of burrowing dinosaurs has appeared [31]. In addition, the IR pulse, while clearly a potentially devastating global event, may not adequately explain the differential survival of small dinosaurs over reptiles, or even larger dinosaurs which may have sheltered from the IR pulse in deep forest environments. Robertson theorizes on bird survival that birds sheltering in dense marsh vegetation survived. Certainly if animals survived in dense marsh vegetation, they would be expected to survive sheltered in deep forest environments, if the forests did not burn, which seems likely given recent data. [32]

Conclusion – And a Warning

Extinction in itself is, throughout geologic history, the norm rather than the exception. The fact that many species perished in the aftermath of the many environmental calamities that occurred around 65 million years ago is hardly surprising. The real question has always been the differential survival of species. Dinosaurs were the dominant land animals for over 100 million years, the dominant herbivores, the dominant predators, ranging from chicken size to the largest land animals that ever lived, adapted to every environment, and living on every continent from pole to pole. The question of how this dominance ended is important, as it is fully possible that without this extinction, dinosaurs would still rule the earth, and mammals might still be rat sized animals rustling through the underbrush.

This theory, if valid, is important for another reason. Today we face the potential of rapid climate change, with unknown and potentially unexpected consequences. A sudden climate change 65 million years ago may have exposed the dinosaurs Achilles’ heel: the need for a warm summer season to reproduce. Man today is the dominant land animal, numerous, on every continent, and adapted to every environment. Every species, even the strongest, eventually suffers extinction. Do we, as a species, have an Achilles’ heel, and if so, will we recognize it in time?

[Ref: [1] “Will the real dinosaurs stand up?”, BBC, September 17, 2008
[2] Schulte et al., “Response–Cretaceous Extinctions”, Science 21 May 2010
[3] Wilf P, Johnson KR, “Land plant extinction at the end of the Cretaceous: a quantitative analysis of the North Dakota megafloral record”, (2004), Paleobiology 30 (3): 347–368
[4] Steven R. Beissinger, Mark I. Cook, Wayne J. Arendt, “The shelf life of bird eggs: testing egg viability using a tropical climate gradient” Ecology, 86(8), 2005, pp. 2164–
[5] White F. N., J.L. Kinney, “Avian incubation”, 1974, Science 186: 107-l 15.
[6] “Miller KG, Kominz MA, Browning JV, Wright JD, Mountain GS, Katz ME, Sugarman PJ, Cramer BS, Christie-Blick N, Pekar SF, The Phanerozoic record of global sea-level change”, (2005). Science 310 (5752): 1293–8.
[7] Berriasian, Valanginian, Hauterivian)”, McArthura JM, Janssenb NMM, Rebouletc S, Lengd MJ, Thirlwalle MF & van de Shootbruggef B, “Palaeotemperatures, polar ice-volume, and isotope stratigraphy (Mg/Ca, δ18O, δ13C, 87Sr/86Sr): The Early Cretaceous” ((2007).. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 248: 391–430
[8] David J. Varricchio, “Bone Microstructure of the Upper Cretaceous Theropod Dinosaur Troodon Formosus”, Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, Vol. 13, No. 1 (Mar. 18, 1993), pp. 99-104
[9] G. Grellet-Tinner et al, “Dinosaur eggs and nesting behaviors: A paleobiological investigation” Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 232 (2006) 294–321
[10] Packard, G. C. and Packard, M. J., “The physiological ecology of reptilian eggs and embryos”, (1988). In Biology of the Reptilia, vol. 16 (ed. C. Gans and R. B. Huey), pp. 523-605. New York: A. Liss.
[11] Richard Shine, “Eggs in autumn: responses to declining incubation temperatures by the eggs of montane lizards”, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, Volume 76, Number 1, May 2002 , pp. 71-77(7)
[12] Wei-Guo Du1, Rajkumar S. Radder, Bo Sun and Richard Shine, “Determinants of incubation period: do reptilian embryos hatch after a fixed total number of heart beats?”, The Journal of Experimental Biology 212, 1302-1306, Published by The Company of Biologists 2009
[13] Paladino, Frank V. , “Temperature-Dependent Sex Determination in Dinosaurs?”, Geological Society of America 238 (1989): 63-69.
[14] Hou L, Martin M, Zhou Z, Feduccia A, “Early Adaptive Radiation of Birds: Evidence from Fossils from Northeastern China”, (1996).. Science 274 (5290): 1164–1167
[15] Clarke, Julia A., “Morphology, Phylogenetic Taxonomy, and Systematics of Ichthyornis and Apatornis (Avialae: Ornithurae)”, (2004): Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 286: 1-179
[16] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palaeognathae#Evolution
[17] Pope KO, Baines KH, Ocampo AC, Ivanov BA, “Energy, volatile production, and climatic effects of the Chicxulub Cretaceous/Tertiary impact”, .J Geophys Res. 1997 Sep 25;102(E9):21645-64.,
[18] Elisabetta Pierazzo, Andrea N. Hahmann, Lisa C. Sloan, “Chicxulub and Climate: Radiative Perturbations of Impact-Produced S-Bearing Gases”,. Astrobiology. January 2003
[19] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Brush-turkey
[20] Sparks, J. and T. Soper. 1987. Penguins. Second Edition. David and Charles, Newton Abbot, London, United Kingdom
[21] Drent, R., “Incubation”, 1975, Pg. 333-420, Avian Biology, Vol. 5
[22] D. Charles Deeming, Mark W. J. Ferguson, “Egg incubation: its effects on embryonic development in birds and reptiles”
[23] Carmen Díaz-Paniagua, “Effect of cold temperature on the length of incubation of Chamaeleo chamaeleon”, Amphibia-Reptilia 28, 2007, pgs. 387-392
[24] Carl P. Qualls, Robin M. Andrews, “Cold climates and the evolution of viviparity in reptiles”, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 1999, pgs 353-376
[25] Kenneth Carpenter, “Eggs, Nests, and Baby Dinosaurs“, 1999
[26] D. C. Deeming, “Ultrastructural and functional morphology of eggshells supports the idea that dinosaur eggs were incubated buried in substrate”, Paleontology, Vol. 49, Part 1, Pgs. 171-185
[27] Alvarez, W., “T. rex and the crater of doom”, Princeton University Press, 1997 p. 14–15.
[28] Powell, J.L., “Night comes to the Cretaceous” Harcourt Brace, 1998,
[29] Douglas S. Robertson, Malcolm C. McKenna, Owen B. Toon, Sylvia Hope, and Jason A. Lillegraven, “Survival in the first hours of the Cenozoic” GSA Bulletin; May 2004; v. 116; no. 5-6; p. 760-768
[30] Tamara J. Goldin1, H. Jay Melosh1 “Self-shielding of thermal radiation by Chicxulub impact ejecta: Firestorm or fizzle?” Geology; December 2009; v. 37; no. 12; p. 1135-1138
[31] David J Varricchio1, Anthony J Martin, Yoshihiro Katsura, “First trace and body fossil evidence of a burrowing, denning dinosaur”, Proceedings of the Royal Society
[32] C.M. Belcher, M.E. Collinson, A.C. Scott “Constraints on the thermal energy released from the Chicxulub impactor: new evidence from multi-method charcoal analysis”, Journal of the Geological Society; July 2005; v. 162; no. 4; p. 591-602
[33] G Keller, A Sahni, S Bajpai, “Deccan Volcanism, the KT mass extinction and dinosaurs”, J. Biosci. 34(5) November 2009, p. 709-728
[34] Self S, Jay A E, Widdowson M, Keszthelyi L P “Correlation of the Deccan and Rajahmundry Trap Lavas: Are these the longest and largest lava flows on Earth?” J. Volcanol. Geother. Res. 172 p. 3-19 ]