Scientist: Aliens may be big jellyfish

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LONDON, July 7 (UPI) -- A British space expert says alien life forms might be large jellyfish-like creatures with organs that ingest atmospheric chemicals for nutrition.

Maggie Aderin-Pocock, who works for European space company Astrium, described her vision of what might have evolved on the Saturnian moon Titan for Science Month, a project by the TV channel Eden, the Belfast Telegraph reported. She also worked with an artist to visualize the aliens.

She said she was inspired partly by studying ocean life forms.

"Our imaginations are naturally constrained by what we see around us and the conventional wisdom has been that life needs water and is carbon-based," Aderin-Pocock said. "But some researchers are doing exciting work, playing with ideas such as silicon-based life forms evolving on other planets in environments very different to our own. My vision of aliens is an inhuman, silicon-based life form that looks much more like a jellyfish than sci-fi's little green men."

Aderin-Pocock believes there may be other forms of intelligent life in the universe, possibly as many as four. But she said the huge differences involved in interstellar travel mean they are unlikely to meet.

"The Voyager 1 spacecraft, which is carrying a recording of greetings from Earth in different languages, has been traveling through the Solar System since the 1970s and has only just made it into deep space," she said.