Gamma ray bursts and life on Earth and in orbit?

So far most of the bursts seen are a long way away, and the levels of
radiation here are thus small, but it makes you think what might be the
result if a large star in our generalneighbourhood blew up in a similar
way. Admittedly, these early blasts were from stars with a different make up
to the currently seen ones, but still, radiation and its ramifications could
well be why life on the planet is only continued through sexual means in
order to correct for radiation induced errors in dna. OK so Oxygen and other
side effects of reactive elements play their part in the changes, but it
does make you wonder about the fate of any life which got going in the
earlier days of the Universe when these large explosions seem to be very
common.

Brian

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On Wed, 29 Apr 2009 11:45:32 GMT, "Brian Gaff"
wrote:

So far most of the bursts seen are a long way away, and the levels of
radiation here are thus small, but it makes you think what might be the
result if a large star in our generalneighbourhood blew up in a similar
way. Admittedly, these early blasts were from stars with a different make up
to the currently seen ones, but still, radiation and its ramifications could
well be why life on the planet is only continued through sexual means in
order to correct for radiation induced errors in dna. OK so Oxygen and other
side effects of reactive elements play their part in the changes, but it
does make you wonder about the fate of any life which got going in the
earlier days of the Universe when these large explosions seem to be very
common.

Brian


Seems to me life wouldn't have gotten started that early in the
universe. Not enough starts would have gone supernova to seed heavier
elements through any gas clouds that second-generation stars (and
planets) would have formed from. Maybe only 3rd-gen stars (and stable
ones at that, like Sol) provide the right conditions for life to
evolve(?)