What might alien life look like?
Today we applied all of our learning about biochemistry to imagine what alien life might look like and explore where it is most likely exists.
Are aliens out there? These kids know where to look!
We uncovered how RNA and enzymes may have possibly formed on the young planet Earth; whether information-storing structures besides nucleic acids can exist; and the possibility of lifeforms not based on carbon.
As it turns out, functional DNA with eight bases, as opposed to four, has already been created in the lab; it is called "hachimoji DNA." In an even more alien discovery, Jasper was able to predict the possibility of silicon-based life by analyzing what makes carbon bonds so useful to life; importantly, silicon, just like carbon, is able to bond with four other atoms. Unfortunately, silicon does not bond as stably.
Finally, we discussed how three factors affect the "habitability," or livability, of an exoplanet or exomoon:
Its size
its atmosphere
its distance from the nearest star.