Once the internet noticed NASA had scheduled a press conference on astrobiology later today, they wasted no time in speculating what the announcement could be. 'There's aliens' they said.
And NASA has only fuelled the conspirator's fires after stating that they have a “finding that will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life.”
In reality, the finding is closer to home than some distant planet. Apparently they have found a bacterium living in an arsenic lake near California’s Yosemite National Park.
Why is that important? You ask. Because the bacterium uses arsenic in place of phosphorus – an element previously considered vital for all forms of life. So this is pretty massive news. We now have life without a vital element of life and this means without the need for phosphorus there are thousands more planets which COULD sustain life of some sort.
But hey, it's not my job to explain the likelihood of alien life that's for NASA to do in an official announcement from them later today.
Source: theregister