No News from Planet No. 5

Every so often, a trace of complex organic material discovered in a meteorite leads scientists to a romantic conclusion. Such chemical traces of life, they say, must mean that the meteor came from a place where life once existed. Most plausible spot: Planet No. 5, which some scientists believe revolved several billion years ago between Mars and Jupiter and later disintegrated to form the swarms of asteroids that now occupy the No. 5 orbit.

Geologist Egon T. Degens of Caltech has all but destroyed this romantic notion. Taking samples from the interiors of two porous nonmetallic meteorites --the sort that are supposed to contain traces of "exo-life"--he ground the material and boiled it, first in water, then in alcohol, then for ten hours in dilute sulphuric acid. After that, he simmered his sample for 22 hours in hydrochloric acid. The well cooked extract contained a rich assortment of chemicals characteristic of living organisms, including amino acids and simple sugars.

But spoilsport Degens was not yet ready for conclusion jumping. After making certain that no more organic material could be extracted from the meteorite powder, he covered his samples with filter paper and let them stand for two weeks. He then boiled them again. From each sample of dust came a fresh assortment of biological chemicals very much like the first. Dr. Degens' conclusion: the dust under the filter paper was reinvaded by ordinary earthly microbes. He is convinced that meteorites analyzed after lying around museums for years are contaminated, too, and offer no proof at all of extra-terrestrial life.

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