Almost every organic molecule has a mirrored counterpart, like a normal screw and a left-handed screw.
Almost none of them occur in the nature.
So we have the technology to synthesize them now, and synthesize a bacteria out of them.
But if you do that, and the bacteria escapes, all your existing medicine will be useless, so you need to re-synthesize all your antibiotics in left-hand configuration.
That typically does not happen with regular bacteria experiments, because most of what you can synthesize in the lab will be a descendant of some other well-known bacteria, which already have an appropriate medicine to treat it, and in most cases it will be effective against your new strain.
Though wouldn’t that incompatibility go both ways? Current drugs and antibodies wouldn’t work with them but wouldn’t they use the mirrored proteins for energy and functioning, thus our bodies would be of no use to them?
I’ve been wondering if bio-compatability would mean one doesn’t have a chance against the other or if it’s more like separate worlds that can only interact at a high level (like via the senses) but not at a lower level (sharing infections, food, and other biological processes).
Worth risking life as we know it just to find out, for shiggles?
The truth is, there will be somewhere that they outcompete native fauna for resources but can’t be stopped by what controls the natives, and whoops, there goes the ecosystem.
I think it would be important to know in the context of space exploration, assuming we can solve the other very hard problems standing in the way of a Star Trek future (though I’m not holding my breath lol), we’d need to know if we should stay the fuck away from any planets we find with life or if we can make contact without potentially dooming both our planet and theirs to potentially returning to the single-celled life stage.
But yeah, it is likely a real world pandora’s box.
What’s that and what do you mean by breathing wrong at the idea? Is someone trying to breed some sort of supervillain bacteria?
Almost every organic molecule has a mirrored counterpart, like a normal screw and a left-handed screw.
Almost none of them occur in the nature.
So we have the technology to synthesize them now, and synthesize a bacteria out of them.
But if you do that, and the bacteria escapes, all your existing medicine will be useless, so you need to re-synthesize all your antibiotics in left-hand configuration.
That typically does not happen with regular bacteria experiments, because most of what you can synthesize in the lab will be a descendant of some other well-known bacteria, which already have an appropriate medicine to treat it, and in most cases it will be effective against your new strain.
Though wouldn’t that incompatibility go both ways? Current drugs and antibodies wouldn’t work with them but wouldn’t they use the mirrored proteins for energy and functioning, thus our bodies would be of no use to them?
I’ve been wondering if bio-compatability would mean one doesn’t have a chance against the other or if it’s more like separate worlds that can only interact at a high level (like via the senses) but not at a lower level (sharing infections, food, and other biological processes).
In theory yes. In practice no one wants to try it.
Maybe?
Worth risking life as we know it just to find out, for shiggles?
The truth is, there will be somewhere that they outcompete native fauna for resources but can’t be stopped by what controls the natives, and whoops, there goes the ecosystem.
I think it would be important to know in the context of space exploration, assuming we can solve the other very hard problems standing in the way of a Star Trek future (though I’m not holding my breath lol), we’d need to know if we should stay the fuck away from any planets we find with life or if we can make contact without potentially dooming both our planet and theirs to potentially returning to the single-celled life stage.
But yeah, it is likely a real world pandora’s box.