CREATION OF THE SUN, EARTH, SOLAR SYSTEM Rhawn Joseph, Ph.D. THE UNIVERSE IS ALIVE The universe is alive and forever recycles and gives birth to planets, galaxies and stars. Giant stars incredibly vast in size, explode, giving birth to hundreds even thousands of infant stars [7,8,9], which come to be ringed with planets, many just like our own [10,11,12]. And this is how our own story begins.... The seeds of life, actual living creatures and their DNA, flow throughout the cosmos and have taken root on innumerable worlds much older than our own. And these genetic seeds contain the DNA instructions for the metamorphosis of all life including woman and man, and this is how life on our planet began. Five billion years ago, a massive star circled by planets teaming with life, began to die, growing smaller, then larger, shrinking then increasing in size, until finally it became a red giant. Solar winds, thick with dust and stellar debris were propelled from deep within the aging heart upwards to the surface of the dying star. These solar winds whipped across the corona, the glowing, pulsating crown of that ancient sun, and streamed into space. These titanic winds enveloped and battered the planets orbiting that dying sun, striking with hurricane force and blowing and carrying away the life-sustaining planetary atmospheres and actual living creatures and their DNA. And then, before the universe could take a breath, that red giant exploded in a vast supernova, casting the shattered remnants of its solar system into the abyss. It is these broken planets and that ancient exploding star which gave birth to our own. After millions of years, those microbes who survived, or their progeny, were flung upon a new world, the Earth, and they went forth to multiply. Life on Earth, came from other planets. FATHER SUN For much of humanity's history on Earth, the sun has been worshipped as a life-giving god which rules the heavens and our solar system. Many a king and queen have claimed to be direct descendants of this all powerful solar deity, the bringer of life. Ancient peoples and civilizations the world over, from Egypt to the Incas of Peru, erected massive stone temples and monuments which faced the rising sun. They held great religious ceremonies to celebrate the celestial cross: the Winter-Summer Solstice and the Spring-Autumn equinox; which were believed to have cosmic significance. The equinox means equality, for the day and the nights are of equal length on these ancient Holy days. Rising in a different constellation every 2160 years, it is the sun's changing position on the morning of the equinox, over thousands of years of time, which the ancients believed heralded a new age and the death and birth of the gods. Thus for 2160 years the sun has risen in the houses of Pieces and Virgo during the Spring and Fall Equinox, which is why the Christian god, Jesus, is linked to Virgo, the virgin, and Pieces the two fish. And before Jesus the Pieces there was the god of the Ram, and before the Ram, Taurus the Bull; a new god and a new age every 2160 years, marked by the rising sun in a different constellation on the day of the equinox. And each new god proclaims: thou shalt honor no gods before me. It is during the equinox that the sun most brilliantly lights up the Earth with dazzling, incredibly bright, multi-colored sheets of light, known as the polar auroras. For millinnea those living in the far northern or southern latitudes have been dazzled by these unearthly solar displays, called the "aurora borealis" in the north, in honor of Aurora, the Roman goddess of the Dawn, and Boreas the Greek god of the wind. In the southern latitudes these ghostly displays of brilliantly colored wavering lights are called the aurora "australis" which is Latin for "south." The auroras become most beautiful and colorful during the Equinox. Ancient peoples believed these were dancing spirits or the shadows of the gods. In fact, these great shows of light are caused by solar winds as they slam into the Earth's protective magnetic field and the upper atmosphere. The magnetic field is produced by electrical currents generated by the Earth's spinning molten iron core, and extends thousands of miles into space, creating a magnetosphere. The solar wind, consisting of charged plasma particles emitted by the sun, collides with the charged particles of the Earth's magnetosphere, electrically exciting and interacting with oxygen and nitrogen gasses and ions, creating a rainbow of shimmering greens, reds, purples and blues. For reasons that are not well understood, the solar wind increases in strength and velocity during the equinox, causing massive geomagnetic storms and extraordinarily colorful auroras; though this is not always the case. From August 28 through September 2, 1859 the Earth was battered by a great magnetic storm triggered by powerful solar winds, solar flares and coronal eruptions from the sun. For five days the planet was enveloped in ghostly shimmering sheets of greens, reds, and blues which were so brilliantly bright that night became day and even the darkest shadows of evening were illuminated with dazzling lights. THE DEATH OF FATHER SUN The last breaths of a dying star are exhaled as titanic, planet shaking, solar winds that grow more powerful and destructive with each dying day. When our own sun begins to die perhaps 6 billion years from now, its solar winds will roll across the Earth like a cosmic tsunami and the night skies will be illuminated for a millennia with fires of light. However, our sun is too small to erupt in a giant supernova, but instead will shrink, then grow, then shrink smaller still until it collapses, implodes and becomes an extremely dense and coldly pale "white dwarf." However, once our sun begins to die, and well before its final collapse, all intelligent Earthly life will suffocate and drop to the ground gasping for breath. Increasingly powerful solar winds will whip our planet with cosmic hurricane gale force and strip the planet of its atmosphere. The oceans and seas will boil away, and the Earth's atmosphere, heavy with dust and watery mist, will be ripped from its moorings and blown into the black void of deep space. The air literally sucked from their lungs, all animals will collapse, gasping for breath, and die. But this would not be the end of Earthly life or life on Earth. Trillions of microbes would continue to thrive buried miles beneath the surface of the planet, completely unaffected by this cosmic calamity. Moreover, as the Earth's atmosphere, top soils, and waters are blown into space, trillions of air-born microbes and viral particles would also be jettisoned into the blackness of eternal night. Some of these microbes would form spores and survive in a dormant state, becoming part of the great cosmic sea upon which flow the seeds of life. A huge nebular cloud would begin to form on the outskirts of the solar system, comprised of dust, debris, frozen water, planetary atmospheres, and the trillions of microbes which had been blown into the far reaches of space. Although the outer layers would be subjected to cosmic radiation and gamma and UV rays, the inner most layers of the cloud would become a protective cocoon. Much of interstellar space is littered with cosmic dust. These are the remnants of ancient stars and dead planets whose fate, our own planet and sun are destined to replicate. And clinging to these particles of dust and hiding deep within the jagged remnants of innumerable worlds, are countless microbes and viral particle--these are the seeds of life, actual living creatures and their DNA, which flow throughout the cosmos. SUPERNOVA: THE BEGINNING BEGINS Life gives birth to life, and stars give birth to stars in an endless cycle of death and rebirth. It's a cosmic dance which may have been ongoing for all eternity. Birth and death are part of the cycle of life. Some stars give birth as they die; becoming red giants and exploding in a vast supernova, spawning hundreds of infant proto-stars [16,17,18]. These super explosions can light up an entire galaxy. Typically, the explosion creates tremendous shock waves, shattering surrounding planets, and expelling most of the star and remaining planetary debris into the surrounding interstellar medium. This debris eventually becomes part of the surrounding nebular ring created by the solar winds, planetary atmospheres, and expelled mass of the dead star [30,31,32]. Over thousands of years and in response to cosmic shock waves, the debris within these clouds begins to clump together, generating tremendous amounts of energy as they grow larger and denser, until finally they ignite, creating hundreds, even thousands of proto-stars [16-18]. Examples of this cosmic reproductive cycle of death and rebirth are all around us. An ancient star of Orion grew old, became a red giant, and exploded in a vast supernova millions of years ago, becoming the largest star factory in the heavens [33-35]. Some of these infant stars may be growing planets which may already harbor life. Others are being destroyed, blow torched and burned to death by a blistering flood of ultraviolet radiation from the region's brightest star [36,37]. Thousands of stars were produced by a supernova and nebula in the area of Scorpio which have now spread out over hundreds of light years, migrating across the constellations of Scorpius, Centarus and Crux in the southern skies [38-40]. These are the survivors, formed from the remnants of an ancient parent star whose planets may have also harbored complex life. Indeed, Dr. Jane Greaves of the University of St. Andrews in Scotland (April , Annual Meeting of the Royal Astronomical Society) has discovered a protoplanet circling a star HL Tau, 520 light-years from Earth. H. L Tau is only 100,000 years old. However, it protoplanet was created just 2,000 years ago and is still growing in size. According to Greaves, in a few hundred thousand years this infant planet could become larger than any in our solar system. Our sun and the rocky debris which formed the Earth, were produced in an identical fashion [41-44]. NOT ALL RED GIANTS ARE CREATED EQUAL There are stars twinkling in the darkness of night which are a thousand times larger than our sun. In our own galactic neighborhood these include KW Sagitarii, V354 Cephei, and KY Cygni, each of which is over 1,500 times as large and contain the mass of 150 of our sun. Another heavy weight champion is Eta Carinae which is just 7,500 light years away and weighs over 100 solar masses. It's 4 million times as bright as the Sun. Eta Carinae is the most luminous star we know of and it's extremely hot - 25,000 Kelvin. VY Canis Majoris, a red hypergiant star in the constellation Canis Major, is more than 2,100 times the size of the Sun. Placed in our Solar System, its surface would extend out past the orbit of Saturn. The largest stars are the cool supergiants. For example, although over 2000 times as large, VY Canis Majoris is only 3,500 Kelvin, compared with the 5,778 Kelvin of our sun. Stars lose mass over time, which is blown away by its solar wind. However, as the star begins to die and becomes a red giant, its loses matter at an accelerated rate. Normally the equilibrium of a star is maintained by the conversion of hydrogen into helium. Within our own sun, 685 million tons of hydrogen is converted to helium each second [23]. The nuclear fusion and conversion of these gasses releases tremendous thermal energy creating an outward pressure which prevents the gravitational collapse and implosion of the star [24,25,26]. As the star grows old the supply of hydrogen fuel begins to dwindle and they cease to generate as much energy. Equilibrium is lost, and the star begins to collapse, making them smaller, but denser, which raises temperatures. In consequence the corona, the crown of the star, begins to expand and the mass of the star is ejected at an accelerated rate in the form of an increasingly dense solar wind. The super red giant Eta Carinae is so large it casts off 500 times the mass of the Earth every year. Eta Carinae is in its death throes and will soon explode as a supernova. This star and its solar system are already surrounded by a nebular shell comprised of dust, gas, and other material swept into space by its powerful solar wind. As hydrogen is used up it is converted to helium and eventually a helium core forms in the heart of the dying star. A star become a red giant after it has burned up most of its hydrogen fuel. The loss of expanding thermal energy causes the star to contract and then collapse from its own weight. However, as hydrogen dwindles, the nuclear reactions radiate outward creating an expanding pressure directed toward the upper layers. Simultaneously the core loses support and mass and then collapses even as the surface of the star grows larger in size. The collapse of the core generates more energy and increases the radiation pressure outward, expanding the star and making it grow increasingly larger in size, becoming a red giant. Thus, the red giant has many times its original size and may have a diameter 10 to 1000 times that of our sun. Luminosities may increase by 1 million times. However, because they are running out of hydrogen fuel, in consequence, they become cooler and may come to have a surface temperature of less than 2000-3000ºC, compared with the 5605 Celsius of our sun. Thus, life on those planets which orbit an expanding star will not necessary be extinguished and burnt completely out of existence. Moreover, when medium mass stars explode, some of their planets may suffer fragmentation but not necessarily obliteration. Although many times their original size, much of the mass of a red giant is ejected into space long before it explodes. Therefore, although full of sound and fury, when a star explodes, its "bark" may be worse than its bite. LOW MASS VS HIGH MASS STARS: SUPERNOVA VS WHITE DWARF Stars the size of our own sun do not explode as supernova or nova unless they have a binary companion. Stars similar to our sun may live 12 or more billion years. When they begin to run out of hydrogen fuel they will quickly lose mass which is ejected into space via the solar wind, forming a nebulae ring. These stars do not explode but instead implode and become a white dwarf surrounded by the ejected gas and dust of the nebula. This will be the fate of our own sun. The most massive, destructive explosions are produced by stars with initial masses 8 times that of our sun (i.e. 8 or more solar masses). Because these super massive stars consume hydrogen at an accelerated rate, the quickly run out of fuel. The life times of these super massive stars are relatively brief, around 1 billion years. One billion years is more than enough time for microbes to take root and flourish on any surrounding planets, but not enough time for complex multi-cellular life to develop. Exploding stars which initially contain 8 or more solar masses may produce a few giant stars or hundreds of small proto stars which may eventually become the size of our own sun. THE MEDIUM MASS PARENT STAR Stars which are several times larger than our sun, but less than 8 solar masses may also explode in supernova, though the resulting explosion is much less powerful or dramatic compared to their heavy weight solar cousins. Instead of hundreds of proto stars, they may produce fewer than a dozen. Some believe that between four to six stars were produced by the supernova which gave rise to our own sun. If true, this indicates that the parent star though certainly many times larger than our sun, was also much less than 8 solar masses. These less massive stars spend billions of years in a steady state. This is due to the reduced energy requirements as contrasted with stars greater than 8 solar masses. Given the paucity of evidence for nearby stars the same age as the sun, it could be assumed only a few protostars may have been produced by the supernova and nebular cloud. Thus, the parent star may have been only a few solar masses larger than the sun. This assumption is supported by measurements of the Murchison meteorites which is laden with microfossils and other indices of life. An analysis of ubiquitous of FE and NI carbides in the rims of magnetite and the carbide grains within the Murchiston meteorite (Brearly 2003) indicates oxidation within the parent body of the meteor, which could have been a planet (Ehrenfreund et al. 2001). Measuments of silicon carbide (Werner et al. 1994; Nittler & Hoppe, 2005) and presolar SiC grains (Savina et al., 2003) from the Murchison indicates that the grains and silicon are most likely the residue of or were produced secondary to a supernova. An analysis the presolar SiC grains and other isotopes, indicates it was impacted by the supernova of a carbon rich intermediate mass star that was between 1.5 to 3 solar masses (Savina et al., 2003). Planets have been detected orbiting intermediate mass stars (Lovis and Mayor 2007). Thus, the Murchison may be a remnant of the parent star's solar system, though this can't be determined at this time. Based on the estimated ages of other intermediate mass stars (Pillitteri and Favata, 2008) it could be assumed the parent star was between 1.5 and 3 solar masses, and at least billion years in age and maybe as many as 6 billion years in age before it entered the red giant phase. Using the Earth as an example, this is also enough time for microbial life to flourish on its planets. If the parent star was 3 solar masses it may have produced less than 6 stars all similar to our sun. Of course this is only an estimate. Our Sun is less than 5 billion years old and the Earth is only 4.6 billion years young. Thus, 6 billion years is more than enough time for complex, intelligent life to evolve. And then after 6 or more billion years and depending on its initial mass, the parent star, like other medium mass stars, began to run out of hydrogen fuel. It then underwent the same dramatic changes as its higher mass cousins. As it grew in size, losing mass in the process, its stellar wind becames stronger, slamming into surrounding planets, ripping away their atmospheres and enriching the surrounding stellar space with dust and other material which began to congregate at the far edges of the solar system. And not just the atmospheres of its many planets, but trillions of air-borne and surface dwelling microbes were swept away by the solar winds and cast into space. This would explain why organic material, including Amino acids and over 100 organic molecules have been found in interstellar clouds; organics similar to those produced by life on Earth. These organics include carbon chains and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. On Earth, these same substances were produced biologically for much of the history of this planet. DEATH AND REBIRTH OF THE SUN GODS Ancient peoples throughout the world worshipped the sun for its life generating powers, believing it a god which governed the cosmic cycle of death and rebirth. In ancient Egypt the morning sun represented rebirth and the god Horus the divine son of Isis and Osiris. The afternoon sun was the God Re, the most powerful of the gods because of his great strength. The redness of the setting sun was the blood of the god as he died. It was the evening sun Atum, the creator god who transported the dead pharoahs to the heavens where they were resurrected and brought back to life to live among the stars which were gods. The sun also died and was reborn, or so believed the ancients, with death and rebirth taking place during a 3 day period beginning on the Winter Solstice, December 22. "Solstice" means, "Sun standing still" and during the Winter Solstice the sun seems to stop its southerly journey toward the underworld, and then to reverse course, ascending northward into the heavens on December 25--the birthday of innumerable gods and sons of gods. Thus, many ancient cultures celebrated the birth and resurrection of the sun on December 25. Every son has a father. The ancient Aryans believed the sun was the "son" of the Sky God, and was thus the "Son of the sky" and had been created and fathered by the Heavenly Father who in turn had been sired by Father Sun. The son of the Sun-God becomes God the Sun. Christians borrowing from the ancient pagans, believed Jesus to be the "son of god" and "god the son" the incarnation of the Heavenly father, and who dies and is resurrected, ascending to heaven, becoming one with god. Thus ancient peoples throughout the world believed the "Son of the Sun-God" was sired by God the Sun, becoming the Sun God who sets and dies and ascends to heaven, is resurrected and reborn to become the Heavenly Father, the Sun, in an endless cycle of death and rebirth, thus guaranteeing eternal life to all god's children--so claim the ancients. THE BIRTH OF THE SUN & SOLAR SYSTEM Five billion years ago, a giant star, likely ringed with planets some just like our own, exploded in a vast supernova, giving birth to less than a dozen new proto stars, including our own Sun. These solar siblings may have included up to 6 sister stars, such as "18 Scorpii" which is nearly identical, and close to the same age as our Sun. "18 Scorpii" dwells in the constellation of Scorpius, just 46 light years away. The Sun and "18 Scorpii" could be twins. Consider, the Sun weighs nearly 2.2 billion billion billion tons and is 865,000 miles in diameter. Over 1 million Earths could easily fit inside the Sun. 18 Scorpii is perhaps a billion tons more massive, and like our Sun, about 880,000 miles in diameter. Like the Earth and the other planets, the Sun rotates on its axis. It completes a 360 degree spin once every 26 days whereas 18 Scorpii takes 23. The temperature of our bright yellow sun is 9,940 scorching degrees Fahrenheit compared to 9,960 degrees on 18 Scorpii. The temperatures of the sun are effected by intense magnetic activity which causes blemishes to break out on the surface. These are known as sunspots, dark splotches on the face of the sun which are much cooler than the surrounding surface. When these black splotches group together, solar flares erupt and coronal masses are ejected from the neighboring areas. Sunspots occur in cycles, waxing and waning every 11 years on our sun, and around 11 years for 18 Scorpii. Other possible solar sisters include HIP 56948. In fact, the Catalog of Nearby Habitable Systems developed by scientists Jill Tarter and Margaret Turnbull, includes 18 Scorpii and HIP 56948, as well as over 118,216 additional stars, that may be orbited by living planets. And like our sun, these stars were created from the remnants of an ancient supernova. When our ancient, parent star exploded, its planets were baked, fried, burned, broken, and blasted apart into gas, dust, and moon-sized islands of debris. Shock waves and the force of the explosion cast the remnants of this ancient star and its planetary system into the chasms of space. Much of this debris became part of the giant swirling, spinning, expanding nebular cloud on the outskirts of the solar system, already created by the solar wind. This expanding shell consisted of dust, microbes, viral particles, spores, oceans of ice, shattered planets, and comets, asteroids and meteors hundreds, even thousands of miles in size [45,46]. Scientific studies have determined that the outer regions of these nebular clouds is very cold and low in pressure and subject to bombardment by UV and gamma rays (B. Fegley, Space Science Review, 1999, 90, 239). However, the inner central most layers cannot be penetrated by gamma and cosmic rays, and are much warmer and thus provides a protective cocoon for those creatures dwelling within. Within a few million years these titanic molecular clouds begin to condense, collide, and clump together, forming planetary nebula, also known as "cometary knots" due to their resemblance to planet-size comets [47,48; (P. Ehrenfreund & K. M. Menten, 2002. From Molecular Cluds to the Origin of Life. In G. Horneck & C. Baumstark-Khan. Astrobiology, Springer, 2002).]. These planet-sized knots of clumpy matter are in motion and begin to rotate faster and faster, becoming hotter and growing denser and larger in size as debris slamms into it. Because of gravitational pressures and cosmic shock waves, eventually these planetary nebula completely collapse and then ignite, creating proto-stars. This is how our own sun was born. The nebular remnants of the parent star formed perhaps a dozen bright burning proto-stars surrounded by clouds of gas, dust, oceans of frozen water, and mountains of stellar debris thousands of miles in size. Not all survived. Within a brief moment of time, ranging from 100,000 years to 50 million years [50-54, Greaves et al], the pressure and density of hydrogen in the centre of each proto star became great enough and temperatures hot enough that it triggered a thermonuclear reaction, with the exploding, expanding thermal energy countering the gravitational forces of contraction thereby creating equilibrium and a full blown star, our sun [55,56]. Thus, our sun was born among a cluster of sister stars some of which survived and are now likely ringed with planets just like our own. BIRTH OF THE PLANETS As thermonuclear equilibrium was established giving stability to our sun, the remaining nebular clouds of gas, hydrogen, dust, heavy metals, oceans of frozen water, and giant masses of rocky planetary debris, continued to spin and began clumping and collapsing together. Thus a proto-planetary disk formed from the remnants of the dead parent star and its broken, shattered planets, and began to flatten out and orbit in the same direction around the sun [57,58,59]. A solar wind began to blow from the new born sun, dispersing the remaining, lighter gaseous elements toward the outer edges of the solar-proto-planetary disk [60,61]. Debris with the highest melting points, such as silicates and metals, formed the inner rims of the planetary disk, congregating together to create the rocky, heavy metal inner terrestrial planets including the Earth [62,63]. Thus, the Earth is comprised of the shattered remnants of the parent star and its rocky inner planets and was born amongst microbe-hugging debris which formed the initial nebular ring and then gave rise to the solar disc. By contrast, water, gasses and lighter elements and compounds were more resistant to the gravitational effects of the still growing sun, but more susceptible to its heat and the solar wind which swept through the infant solar system. Thus these volatile icy compounds and incredibly toxic, poisonous gasses were blown far away and remained at a greater distance from the sun, eventually freezing and becoming part of the big gaseous planets Jupiter and Saturn, and the ice-giants Neptune and Uranus [64-68]. And yet, despite this violent activity, innumerable microbes would have easily survived. A protoplanetary disc consists of layers. Like the nebular cloud, the outermost layer is subjected to gamma and cosmic rays and radiation from the sun. However, the central most layer cannot be penetrated by these deadly rays or UV photons (P. Ehrenfreund & K. M. Menten, 2002. From Molecular Cluds to the Origin of Life. In G. Horneck & C. Baumstark-Khan. Astrobiology, Springer, 2002), and thus provided a protective environment for microbial survivors. Planet formation proceeds at a relatively rapid pace, from a few hundred years for a small rocky planet the size of the Earth to one million years for Jupiter and Saturn-sized gas giants [69-72]. Thus, around 4.6 billion years ago, the Earth and the other planets were formed from the remnants of the dead parent star, and began to orbit in the same direction around the sun. Computer models and observations of planet-formation have given us a clear understanding of the mechanisms involved [64-75]. Within just a few thousand years the remnants of the supernova and the nebular cloud which surrounded our new sun, began to flatten out into a swirling circular proto planetary disk. After just a few spins around the new proto-star, islands of debris began to collide and clump together forming jagged moon-like planets increasing in size by accretion as they orbited our sun. According to the most conservative estimates, if mechanisms of accretion are very slow, it could take up to a million years for a massive solid planetary core to form. Then it would quickly snow ball in size through clumping and as debris continued to crash into it [72-75]. Based on more liberal interpretations, these planetary cores may form in a few thousand years (Greaves, et al.) Greaves has discovered a protoplanet that was created within 2,000 years ago, circling a infant star HL Tau, which is just 100,000 years old. However, these cores may have been present even before our sun was born. Rather than initiated via accretion, they may have been comprised of the broken remnants of those worlds which originally orbited the parent star. Because most of the parent star's mass had been lost before the explosion, the force and destructive power had been greatly reduced and many of its planets although broken or shattered, may have been left largely intact. When the parent star exploded and it's gravitational influences were eliminated, these broken worlds would have been sent tumbling into the the wilds of space, joining the growing nebular cloud, or they may have begun drifting until captured by the gravitational forces of a distant solar system or a new and growing star. Indeed, studies have shown that giant planets orbiting distant stars slowly migrate toward the inner solar system (S. Udry & M. Mayor, The Diversity of Extrasolar planets around solar type stars, In G. Horneck & C. Baumstark-Khan. Astrobiology, Springer, 2002). Thus if the mass of the star is suddenly lost, they will migrate outward. Planets can perturb one another and can eject them from the solar system (S. Udry & M. Mayor, The Diversity of Extrasolar planets around solar type stars, In G. Horneck & C. Baumstark-Khan. Astrobiology, Springer, 2002). Without a giant sun at the center, smaller planets may be ejected by larger planets, only to join a newly forming solar system millions of years later. This may explain why many of the planets of this solar system were struck by wayward worlds which crashed into them during the early years of solar system formation. For example, around 4 billion years ago, a Mars-sized planet hit the Earth with so much force that the ejected mass came to form the moon. Likewise, around 4 billion years ago, the northern plains of Mars was gutted by a planet-sized body which left an elliptical depression 6,600 miles long and 4,000 miles wide. The planet Mercury also suffered a collision which left a titanic impact basis. And the same is true of Uranus which was struck so hard it was knocked on its side leaving its rotation axis tilted at an extreme angle. Thus, there is considerable evidence that planet-sized objects were careening through the solar system during its early stages of formation. Nevertheless, even based on conservative estimates which do not take into account the presence of largely intact planetary bodies, it is clear that multiple planets can form in a relatively short space of time, within the first million years after the birth of the sun. Hundreds of planets have now been detected orbiting distant stars [76-77] which suggests similar mechanisms of planet and star formation take place throughout the cosmos in less than a million years and even within a few hundred thousand years. A million years is more than enough time for any surviving life forms contained in the remnants of the parent star's shattered planets to find safe harbor within a new world made up of this debris. Some microbes become dormant and can rewaken even after 250 million years [78-80]. In fact, only one microbe had to survive, and once on Earth, or another suitable world, could cover the planet in bacterial offspring within a few months. WHERE THERE IS WATER THERE IS LIFE Our planet was formed around 4.6 billion years ago [111,112]. For the next 800 million years our world was bombarded by the remnants of the parent star and its shattered planets, growing in size, alternately melting from the heat generated by the non-stop pounding and then cooling as oceans of ice rained down upon it. Within a few hundred million years after its formation, a huge planetary body over 4000 miles in size, struck the earth [113], casting out a huge chunk of debris which became the moon [114, 115]. The titanic gash in the planet would later become filled with oceans of ice and water falling from space, the watery remnants of the ancient star system that had been destroyed. The outer edge of our solar system is still surrounded by dense clouds of comets composed of frozen water and ice [116-118]--the ejecta from the shattered planets of the parent star. These form what is known as Kuiper belt, which consists of meteors, asteroids, and icy comets [119-121]. At the outer limits of the Kuiper belt orbits the Oort cloud which is believed to consist of frozen oceans of ice [122,123] which had been boiled away or splashed into space when their home planets were burned and broken. The Oort cloud is the source of comets and water-bearing meteors which rain down upon the solar system, delivering oceans of water to the surface of all the planets including the Earth [125-127]. And where this is water, there is life. Indeed, even a simple droplet of water contains millions of myriad life forms [128-130], many of which could survive by forming cold-shock or heat-shock proteins [131-133] or by becoming dormant for millions of years, only to come back to life [134-137]. For the next 700 million years mountains of stellar debris bombarded the Earth and the other planets [138-140]. The mass of the Earth began to grow in size, becoming denser and alternately hotter and colder, melting together and spewing out toxic gasses [141-144]. THE EARTH'S MAGNETIC FIELD Of all the planets in our solar system, only the Earth was ideally suited for genetic engineering and maintaining a developing atmosphere capable of sustaining increasingly complex life. This was made possible in part by the Earth's magnetic field which extends tens of thousands of miles into space, forming a protective magnetosphere [203-205]. The Earths magnetic field is produced by electric currents generated by the planet's liquid metal core [203-207], and supplemented by mountains of magnetite secreted by iron and other mineral eating microbes [208]. As the magnetosphere grew in strength, it began to deflect the sun's powerful solar winds [209,210]. Whereas initially the toxic atmosphere was blown away into deep space, the growing strength of the magnetosphere enabled the replacement atmosphere to remain tethered to the young planet. Mars has a very weak magnetic field, and the solar wind causes the Martian atmospheres to continuously bleed away into space [211]. By contrast, the Earth's magnetic field was able to protect its newly developing atmosphere from the solar wind keeping it bound to Earth. Because of the rotating Earth's circular orbit and distance from the sun there was no danger of the entire planet freezing or burning. Thus, the Earth was an ideal environment for the metamorphosis of complex life. Within a few hundred million years after the Earth first began to form, microbial life began to flourish. And these life forms came from other planets.