Mystery behind 2001 Red Rain unravelled

Kottayam, May 31: The Red Rain phenomenon in Kerala five years ago, might have been caused by biological cells of extraterrestrial origin, a study conducted at the School of Pure and Applied Physics, Mahatma Gandhi University, has said.

Dr Godfrey Louis and his student A Santhosh Kumar in their study claimed that the cause of Kerala's Red Rain during 2001 could be due to biological cells of extraterrestrial origin, University Vice-Chancellor Jancy James said.

Claiming that these findings had attracted international attention, he said further studies were in progress here and collaborative studies were taking place in the UK and the US.

"This finding also supported the theory of 'Panspermia' which proposes that the seeds of life were propagating in the universe through comets," Dr Jancy said.

Prof Nalin Chandra Wickramasinghe, the director of the Cardiff Centre for Astrobiology, UK, who had discussion with Dr Louis and personally verified the experiments done in the University today endorsed the findings.

Collaborative studies were in progress in his laboratory in Cardiff on the Red Rain cells, Dr Wickramasinghe who was also present at the press conference said.

Dr James said the University had set up a laboratory exclusively for studies in Astrobiology and it had the potential to rise to the level of a centre for Astrobiology in future.

Dr Louis' findings were published in the reputed international journal, 'Astrophysics and Space Science'.

According to the finding, the red cells, which caused the red colouration to the rainwater was possibly of cometary origin. The Red Rain was a result of atmospheric disintegration of a cometary fragment, which presumably contains a dense collection of red cells.

The geographical and time distribution pattern of the Red Rain incidents and the sonic boom before the first occurrence were evidences that supported this theory.

The optical and electron microscopic study and the elemental analysis supported the biological nature of the cells. The Study had also shown that such cells were devoid of DNA, which further supported their possible extraterrestrial origin.

UNI