Chapter 1228 Atmospheric Modification Substance?

Not a short period of time has passed since the completion of the lunar scientific research station. The population living on the moon has almost doubled every year, and now it has grown to more than 50 people.

However, this population growth is not without limit.

Beginning this year, the Lunar Orbit Construction Committee has announced that it will limit the increase in the number of permanent residents on the lunar surface in the short term, and requires the management unit to keep the current scientific research plan and lunar resource development plan unchanged. The number of resident personnel at the scientific research station is controlled below 60 people.

The reason for making such an arrangement is not entirely because people imagine that the cost of maintaining an astronaut living in space is too high, but that the actual conditions do not allow it.

Just like the sanitation problems faced by many megacities, although the population size of the lunar scientific research station is far from the level of a city, the difficulty of solving sanitation problems is increasing with the Population growth is magnified exponentially.

According to the needs of an adult’s normal life, the domestic waste produced a day is about 1 kg, of which metabolic waste accounts for more than 50%. However, there is almost no way for the lunar scientific research station to completely dispose of these metabolic wastes.

Even if the lunar surface planting unit can consume part of the feces and urine to allow organic matter to re-enter the cycle, the efficiency of this cycle is not so high.

Coupled with the contamination of some bacteria and microorganisms, sanitation and safety have become a problem that cannot be ignored on the lunar scientific research station. Just to transport those domestic wastes back to the earth has already taken up the capacity and resources of an entire transport ship.

If the size of the population continues to expand, I am afraid that the Lunar Orbit Construction Committee will have to plan a special route for transporting feces.

However, the emergence of Dr-111 active microorganisms brought a turning point for everything.

No one knows where it came from. It is as if the project suddenly appeared in the database and was suddenly assigned to study it one day.

Although some people have wondered who the big cow is and where he collected such awesome microbial samples, but due to the lack of literature, all this is unknown.

Drinking coffee, looking at the data fed back from the lunar scientific research station on the screen, Lu Zhou showed such an expression on his face.

As he guessed, this Dr-111 microbe wasn't that simple.

In an aerobic environment, while decomposing metabolites through respiration, it will also accumulate a ketone substance. In fact, although this ketone substance is harmless to other organisms, it is harmful to itself. Harmful.

Prolonged exposure to aerobic environments causes the entire microbiota to reproduce slowly and eventually self-destruct.

But on the contrary, if it is in a high nitrogen, carbon dioxide concentration, and light environment, this microorganism will explode with amazing reproductive ability and eating ability.

While phagocytizing and decomposing metabolites, it will generate oxygen through similar photosynthesis, and fix solar energy in a special amino acid molecular chain.

Although the taste of direct consumption may not be so ideal, this special amino acid molecular chain can be digested by most organisms, which means it can directly enter the circulation of the ecosystem.

Not only that, this creature has an extraordinary tolerance to low-gravity environments, and even under the direct irradiation of cosmic rays, it can maintain the stability of its overall traits by decomposing and phagocytizing its own cancer cells.

This thing is simply an excellent waste purification substance!

It’s a waste of talent to be used on Earth, and space stations and space colonies are where it really should go.

After seeing the experiment report from beginning to end, the expression on Lu Zhou's face became more and more satisfied. Then at this moment, a flash of inspiration suddenly flashed in his mind - or a brain hole.

"Could this thing be some kind of man-made atmosphere-altering substance?"

A civilization that entered the interstellar age created it, and then planted it on the chaotic planet that had just formed its atmosphere to colonize its own civilization.

This intriguing microbe thrives in a high-carbon-dioxide atmosphere, growing exponentially, even covering the surface of an entire planet.

Finally, in the countless stellar years, it acts as both a producer and a decomposer, absorbing excess carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen, accelerating the process of atmospheric evolution, and allowing more carbon elements to be fixed through photosynthesis to be Organic matter directly used by living organisms enters the biosphere cycle.

And in the final stage, as the oxygen continues to rise, photosynthesis gradually turns into respiration, and the ketones produced begin to kill this microorganism and make it lose its ability to reproduce until it is completely removed from the entire ecosystem. disappears.

After completing all these tasks, a chaotic planet covered with carbon dioxide may be able to complete the atmospheric evolution process that originally required hundreds of millions of years in only a few dozen stellar years.

Once this brain hole was opened, it couldn't stop. The more Lu Zhou thought about it, the more he felt that it was possible.

After all, there are too few planets in this universe with atmospheric environments suitable for the survival of carbon-based organisms, and the oxidation reaction is the way for most organisms to obtain energy.

Under the conditions of natural evolution, it may take hundreds of millions of years for a chaotic planet full of carbon dioxide and nitrogen to become a relatively livable world with prosperous species.

If a civilization has developed to the level of an interstellar civilization and can expand its territory to an area within hundreds of light years through superluminal means, it is not impossible to master planetary transformation technology.

Even, this is almost a necessity.

After all, the nature of civilization is to transform nature.

Only beasts will choose to be submissive.

"I didn't expect to find such an incredible thing..."

Shocked by his own thoughts, Lu Zhou's pupils were gradually stained with excitement.

If his idea is true, the microorganisms in his hands at this moment will not be as simple as a "space version of waste purifier", but a living fossil from a certain advanced civilization!

Among them, what is worth studying is not only the microorganism itself, but also the biological modification technology and genetic modification technology it may contain.

It is not clear how much can be reversed from it, but even if there is only a small gain, it will be of great help to human civilization, which is still in the early space age.

In addition, Lu Zhou also thought of Mars, which is close at hand.

It is not realistic to directly modify the atmosphere of Mars. After all, the gravity of Mars is too small and there is no protection of the magnetic field. Even if an atmosphere similar to that of the earth is created, it will probably be lost in the end.

However, if a relatively closed large-scale biosphere is established in a limited area, the feasibility is still quite large.

With the environmental modification ability of this kind of microorganisms, as long as the method and modification plan are used properly, it may not be a problem to create such a closed biosphere on Mars.

Thinking of this, for some reason, Lu Zhou suddenly remembered what the observer had said to him, and a thought of extreme fear rose in his heart inexplicably.

It is unlikely that everything is the best arrangement.

But maybe...

This solar system may really be "designed"...

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