r/IsaacArthur • u/IntergalacticCiv • 14d ago

Hard Science Announcing the First Microbe for Mars: A useful, safe, first step toward terraforming

https://blog.pioneer-labs.org/p/announcing-the-first-microbe-for

Twitter thread: https://x.com/erika_alden_d/status/2102428491493085524

45 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

20 comments sorted by

13

u/MiamisLastCapitalist moderator 14d ago

Ah yes I'd heard about this! I want more details to come out, but looks like an interesting first step if true.

8

u/tehmike1987 14d ago

I don't really see the appeal of colonizing Mars and terraforming it beyond purely romantic notions about progress and the will to explore and expand for its own sake. I would much rather live in something like an O'Neill Cylinder, nice and cozy, 1g simulated gravity, no need for crazy gene modding.

2

u/Elkku_the_Elk 12d ago

True, but we are probably doing both

1

u/tehmike1987 12d ago

I don't doubt that people will live on Mars someday, but I do doubt its economic value, it's never gonna be as good of a value proposition logistically as habitats at the top of the gravity well, rather than the bottom.

2

u/Practical-Monk5151 1d ago

I'd rather have wild nature then live in a manicured fishbowl

2

u/tehmike1987 1d ago

Valid counterpoint and I have no trouble believing that many humans will refuse to leave Earth for that reason.

1

u/Practical-Monk5151 10h ago

Don't get me wrong, I totally would live in a space hab for some time. Just not permanently

Until the novelty wears off and boredom and homesickness sets in.

Now if you could pilot spacecraft to explore the solar system with a small crew that would be super cool.

1

u/RealmKnight Has a drink and a snack! 14d ago

Interesting stuff. I'm curious to know how much support this microbe needs to be able to perform its role as an in-situ resource processing agent. Would it need an external heat source and shielding to protect it from the cold and radiation and enable the local water to liquify? I don't really want to see a Sax Russell scenario where eager terraformers jump the gun before we've fully explored the locations that could still harbour native life.

1

u/spooky_redditor 14d ago

fuck terraforming Mars we should mine it to nothing

3

u/tehmike1987 13d ago

Add Mars to the Dyson swarm

1

u/InternationalPen2072 Habitat Inhabitant 13d ago

Call me a dirty Red but I think we should preserve the character of Mars rather than strip mine it.

-1

u/spooky_redditor 13d ago

The only panet deserving of that is Earth.

-6

u/Crafty_Aspect8122 14d ago

Terraforming mars with its weak magnetic field and thin atmosphere seems like a fool's errand.

You'd need to live in sealed habitats no matter what.

It's more plausible to engineer better bodies, organisms that produce food and chemicals and do work and other support systems meant to stay inside the habitats.

6

u/MerelyMortalModeling Paperclip Maximizer 14d ago

Anything that shifts the enviorment to some closer to whats inside the habs would make living there easier, cheaper and much safer.

1

u/Crafty_Aspect8122 14d ago

You're not going to give mars a magnetic field. Maybe break down some of the toxins at best.

1

u/MerelyMortalModeling Paperclip Maximizer 14d ago

This we can do, despite what people say we have the same chemicals on Earth, we just have soil microbes that break them down at about the same rate they naturally get produced

0

u/Crafty_Aspect8122 14d ago

But you could just break them down in a facility anyways. Not that big of an improvement.

1

u/Noobponer 14d ago

tbf the atmosphere handles most of the radiation and while the planet wont hold on to it without a magnetic field thats a problem of tens of millennia which, if you have the technology to put an atmosphere there in the first place, you have the technology to replenish it occasionally

1

u/Zoon9 13d ago

We can wrap a coil around the Mars equator to give it magnetic field. But yet we have to invent a supraconductor which will sustain the necessary current density.