NASA's Cassini Spacecraft Finds Ingredient of Household Plastic in Space

This discussion takes place about once a day. The HN guidelines state "don't editorialize titles". This is one of the guidelines that is most visibly and aggressively enforced by the moderators. For better of for worse, it's what we're stuck with.

Is this dumbed-up headline from The Register better? (I think not.)

TUPPERWARE FOUND on ALIEN MOON: Space probe's shock discovery

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/10/01/nasa_find_tupperware...

The headline I submitted it was 'NASA discovers polypropolene on Saturn's moon Cassini, to scientists' surprise'. I too found the original title uninformative, but chose the JPL website as it was the closest thing to an original source. I am tired of HN mods modifying headlines to make them less informative. Having said that I was tired and wrote Cassini in the title instead of Titan :-/

Sadly when the submitter does that the moderators just change it to the article title anyway.

As far as indications of life go, we're looking for substances that might have been freshly produced by a biological organism. That's not as easy as it sounds, since we're always discovering new abiogenic processes that make even complex hydrocarbons.

Methane is abundant in the universe at large. You can find it in huge quantities in gas giants. There is evidence for seasonal methane deposits on Mars, but so far none of the observations suggest that it has been put there by a life form.

Chemistry in space is interesting, because it sheds some light on the early conditions on Earth and other habitable worlds. It was first thought that planets start with only simple elements and more complex molecules would have to be generated by the environment. Now we see increasingly that more complex chemistry is indeed going on in space as well and this in turn means planets do get seeded with more higher-order stuff than previously thought.

Spectroscopy suggests that compounds as complex as linked amino acids can and do form in deep space! This is also interesting for biologists since a non-biological origin for these molecules drastically improves the likelihood and timeframe for the formation of carbon-based lifeforms. It also means we're likely to find more amino acid-based life out there, which is nice.

Propene in itself is not that surprising of a find, it's more like another piece of the puzzle falling into place.

Of course, this all has nothing to do with plastic. That's just bad copy writing in a weak attempt to draw public interest.

Methane is not an indication of life. It's too common. But if you can find methane in rock then you can check the rock and see if it's a type that could make methane.

For more fun read: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenic_oil

More complex hydrocarbons are associated with carbon-based life forms (e.g. most of the stuff we use to make plastics come from crude oil which came from the decomposition of carbon-base lifeforms). IIRC, methane is one of the simplest hydrocarbons and thought to be naturally-occurring throughout the universe. Other complex hydrocarbons on the other hand...?

(disclaimer: I might be wrong)