Life in meteorites? Study stirs debate, MSNBC

"Many scientists have examined thousands of meteorites in detail over the past 50 years without finding any evidence of fossil life," David Morrison, senior scientist at the NASA Astrobiology Institute at Ames Research Center, told me in an e-mail. "Further, we know a great deal about the conditions on the parent objects of the meteorites, which (not counting the few meteorites from the moon and Mars) were rather small, not at all like planets. "I would therefore invoke Carl Sagan's famous advice that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. At a bare minimum this would require publication in a prestigious peer-refereed scientific journal -- which this is not. Cyanobacteria on a small airless world sounds like a joke. Perhaps the publication came out too soon; more appropriate would have been on April 1," Morrison said."

NASA Scientist Sees Signs of Life in Meteorites, New York Times

"The buzz is building over a paper by Richard Hoover, an award-winning astrobiologist at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, concluding that filaments and other features found in the interior of three specimens of a rare class of meteorite appear to be fossils of a life form strongly resembling cyanobacteria. Chemical analysis, Hoover argues, shows no evidence that the fossils are of organisms that infiltrated the meteorites after they arrived on Earth."

NASA Scientist Claims Evidence of Alien Life on Meteorite, Fox

"Other scientists tell FoxNews.com the implications of this research are shocking, describing the findings variously as profound, very important and extraordinary. But Dr. David Marais, an astrobiologist with NASA's AMES Research Center, says he's very cautious about jumping onto the bandwagon. These kinds of claims have been made before, he noted -- and found to be false. "It's an extraordinary claim, and thus I'll need extraordinary evidence," Marais said."

Keith's note: Richard Hoover is a NASA employee - and has received NASA funds to do astrobiology research. Hoover cites several NASA employees and NASA facilities used in support of this research. Yet NASA has been silent thus far about the claims Hoover makes in this latest paper - claims he makes overtly using his "NASA" affiliation. Did Hoover fill out NASA Form 1676 or get internal review or permission at NASA MSFC to publish this paper?

Given the way that NASA SMD stumbled and mishandled recent stories related to Arsenic-based life forms and "habitable planets" found by Kepler, it will be curious to see if SMD and/or the NASA Astrobiology Institute say anything at all. Not doing so now will allow media speculation (and misinformation) to run rampant by default - thus leading to the inevitable big public mea culpa down the road. The question remains: Does NASA support Hoover's research? If so, then is there a proposal he submitted to NASA to obtain funding - and why is NASA silent? If not, then why is this research being done with a NASA affiliation using NASA facilities - and (again) why is NASA silent?

There is another thing that has me a little confused. This NASA MSFC web page from 2007 lists Hoover as having a Bachelor's degree and working in the Astrobiology Laboratory as a "scientist". Yet this NASA MSFC web page from 2005 (two years earlier) refers to him as "Dr. Richard Hoover". Which is it? Usually one gets their B.Sc. degree before their Ph.D. - not the other way around. In his paper Hoover refers to himself as "Richard B. Hoover, Ph.D. NASA/Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL". I cannot seem to find an online CV for Hoover that lists where he got his Ph.D. This 1992 NASA press release only says that he "graduated with honors from Henderson State University in Arkadelphia, Ark., in 1964 with a bachelor of science degree in physics and mathematics." He was hired by NASA in 1966. Its always possible to get a Ph.D. later in life but it would seem a little odd that NASA MSFC would put someone in charge of their astrobiology work and fund them if they only had a Bachelors degree - in Physics and Mathematics.