I imagine they are, but unless it is a commom and well known in research and labs it will likely take a good chunk of time to fully confirm 100%. A few weeks at the earliest, perhaps a couple months unless it is very obscure on Earth.
Ocean of Storms: A Timeline of A Scientific America
- Thread starter BowOfOrion
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As you asked if anyone gets your Arthur C. Clarke references, this section is based on A Fall of Moondust.
Glad to see the classics are alive and well.
I'd been struggling for some kind of incident in this chapter. Twenty pages of transition was probably pushing it, but I realized it had been a while since we'd talked about anything besides Mars.
To be fair, dust at least makes sense to my eyes. Plus, it's a good learning experience.
puts on astrobiologist hat
Doesn't mean the microbes aren't ultimately terrestrial in origin, just that if they are, they've probably been on Mars for a long time, long enough to evolve into different metabolic guilds.
If they aren't able to sequence the microbes' 16RS at all, then that means the microbes really are extraterrestrial in nature, since their DNA is so different that the sequencing primers used for terrestrial biology can't bind to it.
The fact that there are methanogens and methanotrophs suggests that these bugs are indigenous to Mars, since they'd form a complete ecology--this sort of synthrophism with methanogens producing methane from inorganic carbon and methanotrophs consuming it is very common on Earth. Bacterial contamination by human missions would be very unlikely, imo, to lead to a complete ecology like this.
Doesn't mean the microbes aren't ultimately terrestrial in origin, just that if they are, they've probably been on Mars for a long time, long enough to evolve into different metabolic guilds.
This is exactly how'd they do it--specifically, they'd try to sequence its 16RS ribosomal RNA (since that portion of the genome is highly conserved across terrestrial life) and construct an evolutionary phylogenetic tree from that.
If they aren't able to sequence the microbes' 16RS at all, then that means the microbes really are extraterrestrial in nature, since their DNA is so different that the sequencing primers used for terrestrial biology can't bind to it.
Well, now that you've posted this, I'm going to have to steal it outright.
Thanks for the expertise!
As an aside, Warball was developed after a conversation I had with Andy Weir about new sports that could be played on the Moon. Between that and American Gladiators, I found some inspiration.
I tried to develop the idea as a proper sport, complete with rules and field diagrams. I tried to have a tournament in my area to drum up some interest in the sport. It was scheduled for March of 2020... yeah. I invented a sport where you have to gather around a bucket full of balls while the other team charges towards you... and premiered it at the beginning of the biggest pandemic of the century.
If anyone's interested, these were some of the things I developed for the sport itself.
I tried to develop the idea as a proper sport, complete with rules and field diagrams. I tried to have a tournament in my area to drum up some interest in the sport. It was scheduled for March of 2020... yeah. I invented a sport where you have to gather around a bucket full of balls while the other team charges towards you... and premiered it at the beginning of the biggest pandemic of the century.
If anyone's interested, these were some of the things I developed for the sport itself.
Hello, newbie here. Just wanted to say I truly love this story. So well written, I'm a bit jealous not being able to write stuff like this ! Btw how did you knew Andy Weir ? you lucky man, really.
In passing, the DynaSoar picture on the first post is dead.
Keep on the good work !
In passing, the DynaSoar picture on the first post is dead.
Keep on the good work !
Thanks for the kind words.
I'm working on a proper cover for the opening post. Just waiting on an image that I think will be perfect. Once I have that together, I'll replace the DynaSoar picture on the initial post.
As far as Andy Weir, I simply messaged him and found him to be very open and friendly. I'm sure these days he's inundated with messages, but I think he was complemented by my work on the Artemis story, which has opened a (small) dialog between us both.
Good morning, my fellow readers,
An opportunity has come up and I wanted to present an offer for those who are interested.
Back in January, I recommended a book to you called Hot Moon, by Alan Smale. Alan is a fantastic author of alternate history. I've been absolutely in love with Hot Moon and his Clash of Eagles series.
I found an online campaign a few months ago that Dr. Smale was supporting and it had a chance to speak with him via Zoom call. I immediately took the action and I'll be speaking to him sometime in the next few weeks.
I wanted to see if any of my readers who took up my recommendation had questions for him, so if anyone has something they'd like to ask, please let me know and I'll do what I can to pass the question along.
In the meantime, I'm hard at work on the next chapter of OoS, which will be an adventure for John Crichton and the crew of Athena III.
As always, thank you for reading!
An opportunity has come up and I wanted to present an offer for those who are interested.
Back in January, I recommended a book to you called Hot Moon, by Alan Smale. Alan is a fantastic author of alternate history. I've been absolutely in love with Hot Moon and his Clash of Eagles series.
I found an online campaign a few months ago that Dr. Smale was supporting and it had a chance to speak with him via Zoom call. I immediately took the action and I'll be speaking to him sometime in the next few weeks.
I wanted to see if any of my readers who took up my recommendation had questions for him, so if anyone has something they'd like to ask, please let me know and I'll do what I can to pass the question along.
In the meantime, I'm hard at work on the next chapter of OoS, which will be an adventure for John Crichton and the crew of Athena III.
As always, thank you for reading!
Just to check:
The list of presidents in this timeline goes Johnson, RFK (two terms), Carter, Reagan (one term + partial second term), Bush (remainder of Reagan's second term), McCain (two terms), Powell? Seems like an awful lot of Republican rule in the White House, considering that OTL has never had anything like a 23-year streak of either party.
The list of presidents in this timeline goes Johnson, RFK (two terms), Carter, Reagan (one term + partial second term), Bush (remainder of Reagan's second term), McCain (two terms), Powell? Seems like an awful lot of Republican rule in the White House, considering that OTL has never had anything like a 23-year streak of either party.
That list is accurate, but it should also include JFK. When you think about it, you had Democrats in the White House from 1960-1980, then a shift to Republicans since. In OTL, America tends to have more mood swings, but I went a different way with this. Partly to explore the narrative, and partly to show a certain continuity.
It's also of note, and I've tried to demonstrate this wherever possible, that the Republican Party in OoS is very different in its stances from the OTL version. The social programs and policies that were established in OoS by Democrats (AmeriCare, Abortion stances, Social Justice programs) had time to cement themselves in the public eye and Republicans in OoS did not lean into religious or identity politics. The extreme elements in the GOP were cast aside, which led to them reforming into a more violent wing that chose methods other than political to pursue their aims.
Just wanted to thank @nixonshead for the spiffy new cover for Ocean of Storms. I had to shrink it a bit to meet the file size requirements (which breaks my heart). You can view the thing in it's proper size on my threads or Instagram.
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For the record folks, Alan Smale is exactly as great as I was hoping he'd be. A fascinating author and an incredible student and master of alternate history. If you haven't read him, stop what you're doing and find his work.