Science fiction

When considering how the evolution of life could have come about, the seeding of terrestrial life by extraterrestrial bacterial spores traveling through space (panspermia) deserves mention. Much is said about the possibility of some form of life on other planets, including Mars or more distant celestial bodies. Is it possible for some remnants of bacterial life, enclosed in a protective coat of rock dust, to have traveled enormous distances, staying dormant at the extremely low temperature of space and even surviving deadly radiation The spore may be neither alive nor completely dead, and even after billions of years it could have an infinitesimal chance to reach a planet where liquid water could restart its life. Is this science fiction or a real possibility We don t know. Around the turn of the twentieth century Svante Arrhenius (Nobel Prize in chemistry 1903) developed this theory in more detail. There was much recent excitement about claimed fossil bacterial remains in a Martian meteorite recovered from Antarctica (not since... 

For molecules similar to safrole or allylbenzene we take the work done on any terminal alkene such as 1-heptene, 1 octene. Another term to look for is olefin which is a term for a doublebond containing species. What we then look for are articles about these olefins where the functional groups we are looking for are formed. Articles with terminology like methyl ketones from (P2P), ketones from , amines from etc. Or when we want to see about new ways to aminate a ketone (make final product from P2P) we look for any article about ketones where amines are formed. Sound like science fiction to you Well, how do you think we came up with half the recipes in this book It works ... 

Leary, W. E. (1998). Ion Propulsion of Science Fiction Comes to Life on New Spececraft. The New York Times, Oct. 6. 

Born in London, Paul May grew up in Redditch, Worcestershire. He went on to study at Bristol University, where he graduated with a first class honours in chemistry in 1985. He then joined GEC Hirst Research Centre in Wembley where he worked on semiconductor processing for three years, before returning to Bristol to study for a PhD in plasma etching of semiconductors. His PhD was awarded in 1991, and he then remained at Bristol to co-found the CVD diamond research group. In 1992 he was awarded a Ramsay Memorial Fellowship to continue the diamond work, and after that a Royal Society University Fellowship. In October 1999 he became a full-time lecturer in the School of Chemistry at Bristol. He is currently 36 years old. His scientific interests include diamond films, plasma chemistry, interstellar space dust, the internet and web technology. His recreational interests include table-tennis, science fiction, and heavy metal music. 

To be practical, then, nanotechnology must be precise, extremely fast, and amenable to mass production. Perhaps this strikes you as definitely in the realm of science fiction rather than science fact, and perhaps it is. Nevertheless, scientists at many universities are vigorously tackling the challenges of this field, and major technology companies have active research groups as well. 

A gear-shaped molecule spins freely on a copper metal surface. A molecular soccer ball nestles snugly in a cavity on a protein. It sounds like science fiction, but these creations are real developments in the blossoming field of nanotechnology. The term nanotechnology refers to science carried out at the nanometer scale (lmn = 10 m). 

In recent years, Mary Shelley s Frankenstein has often been described as the first science fiction novel.i Brian Aldiss, himself a writer of science fiction, amongst others identified... 

Lambert, Ronald R. The last alchemist. Analog Science Fiction Science Fact 99, no. 1 (Jan 1979). 

This chapter concludes with a fairly abstract introduction to future challenges, as we see them, and a brief science fiction story, which also functions as an epilogue. 

Whether for a dramatic scene or a science-fiction fantasy, the use of artificial fog to create ambience and special effects is commonplace in theatrical and film productions. On what basic chemical principles do fog machines operate ... 

Moving now from science fiction by philosophers to science fiction by scientists, we can describe circumstances under which evolutionary psychological explanations would be indisputably correct. Suppose, for instance, that rape was indeed caused by a particular module in the brain. This can be a module possessed by all males but activated only under certain circumstances (in which case, the explanation of rape will of course be incomplete), or a module peculiar to rapists. It must be a module produced by some set of genes, and those genes must have been selected in part, at least, because of their tendency to produce rape-generating brain modules. Generalising, we can identify the following three principles ... 

Life which exists, or could exist, outside our Earth is generally known as extraterrestrial life. A distinction is also made between life (or possible life) within or outside the solar system. In spite of what is claimed in many science fiction books and films, there is no single piece of evidence for a living system outside Earth. The coming years and decades will hopefully provide clarity on the question as to whether we are really alone in the universe or not. 

The phase of science fiction stories about little green men from Mars is hopefully over, and the question can only be are there, or were there ever, real living systems there, or can we find traces of precursors of life in the form of biomolecules ... 

Taking a value of 107 for N would mean that in our galaxy (with its perhaps 100 billion stars), there could be several million planets with life forms capable of interstellar communication. However, if these were distributed statistically, the nearest would still be 200 light years away from Earth. One point is important the term probability used in the Drake equation is interpreted in the sense of subjective probability (a term from the nomenclature used by statisticians and probability theorists), as the numerical value of this probability is determined only by the experience of the scientist concerned (Casti, 1989). Casti also provides more information on the Drake factors (apart from the factor fs) in the chapter Where are they then In summary, we can say that the Drake equation is a first attempt to quantify the ETI problem in order to move from the area of science fiction and pure speculation to that of serious scientific debate. 

The notion of radium-filled caverns creating precious jewels and metals by transmutation seems to have been a fixture in science fiction stories of the period. The 1929 novella The Radium Pool, first published in Science Wonder Stories by Ed Earl Repp, also features a radium pool that transmutes a cave into precious metals and jewels, acts as a fountain of youth, and provides telepathic and death ray abilities to Jovians who have come to appropriate its radium for Jupiter, the most powerful planet in the universe. 

Bleiler, Richard (ed.). 1999. Science Fiction Writers Critical Studies of the Major Authors from the Early Nineteenth Century to the Present Day. 2nd edition. New York Scribner s. 

Westfahl, Gary. 1990. An Idea of Significant Import Hugo Gemsback s Theory of Science Fiction. Foundation The Review of Science Fiction 48 (Spring 1990) 26-50. 

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