WHEN red rain fell over southern India in 2001 it was sensationally suggested that the red particles in the rain could be alien microbes. Now, after weeks of analysis at two labs in the UK, microbiologists are still struggling to identify them. It sounds like an episode of The X-Files, but a down-to-Earth explanation is looking the more likely outcome.
Astronomer Chandra Wickramasinghe is studying the cells with microbiologists at Cardiff University. “As the days pass, I’m getting more and more convinced that these are exceedingly unusual biological cells,” he says.
The red rain fell sporadically over Kerala during two…
