Posted by Ensign Rand Farquharson (Yeoman First Class) in Side sim: Early Morning in the Lab

Posted by Commander Roman Alden (First Officer & Chief Science Officer) in Side sim: Early Morning in the Lab

Posted by Ensign Rand Farquharson (Yeoman First Class) in Side sim: Early Morning in the Lab
Posted by… suppressed (3) by the Post Ghost! 👻

(snip)
Rand nodded, “I’ll have Randy look at it, to make sure.” If her hand was still cramped she wasn’t sure what she would do. She stood up placing her spoon in the bowl and the cover on top and carrying it, left handed, to the tray. She left her glass on the table, not done with it yet. She helped collect the few various things that were left. She went back to her seat and sipped at the ice water in her glass. It was work but she was interested in what he did, “Did you get everything in planetary science worked out?”

Rand

Once everything was cleaned up and put on the tray to return to the galley, Roman took his seat again as well. “They’ve been studying the findings from an uninhabited planet that may be able to sustain life at some point in the far future. We’ve done all we can with the information we have, so I was finalizing the project and results.” It was a work question, but he loved what he did and he knew she found it interesting, too. “It is in its beginning stages of evolving life. Nothing larger than a bacteria exists just yet.”

~ Roman

“I know we’ve mapped early biological evolution on Earth. But combined with information from the Vulcan Science Academy and other databases can you predict what toes of life they might evolve into? Like animal, plant, like that?” Rand knew predictions were just educated guesses and not absolute, but it was fascinating to her that it could be done. She was always curious how it was done, how they were able to map backwards.

Rand

“It’s too early for that. Judging by the chemical makeup of the atmosphere and the type of bacteria it could be earthlike, a future class M. But as for how exactly life will evolve, at this stage there is no way to tell.” This was what the planetary scientists had concluded in their studies. They also concluded that if the planet was left to natural development it would probably take thousands to tens of thousands of years to evolve the bacteria like life forms into complex, earth like life.

~ Roman

“Oh.” Rand grinned. She had more questions than had answers apparently. “Anything interesting about the planet and bacteria? Or just that it was there?” Then a thought occured to her, “Can the bacteria safely be studied in a lab? With the environment and atmosphere being so different?”

Rand

“It has to be kept in an environment suitable to it, or it’ll die, but even if some of it does die, we can still look at the molecular structure and makeup of it.” Roman explained. “Currently the planet isn’t dissimilar to Earth before life evolved. Rocky, some water, not much else. The report will be findable on Starfleet’s system as soon as science command approves it.”

~ Roman

“Like a molecular autopsy then?” Rand’s head got that looks she always did when she was about to ask a question, she’d thought of something. As Roman would know it was pure curiosity and came from a place of wanting to know more. Not simply brainless flotsam, but Rand didn’t ask right away. She was hesitant to talk about the biology lab because she still felt really bad about what had happened. She knew Roman wasn’t upset with her, she was upset with herself. “Do the same standards of ethical treatment apply to bacteria as does the animals in your lab? They’re still living creatures aren’t they?”

Rand

“Sort of, yeah,” Roman replied. She was doing that curious look again, the one that meants she wanted to know more. “They don’t experience sensation the same way as a more complex life form, like the animals, so while they are living and do move they’re more like plants than animals in that aspect. So no, they aren’t held to the same standards as the animals.” He didn’t mind explaining in fact he always liked the interest she took in what he did.

~ Roman

Rand was thinking hard about that. She started talking…thinking out loud. Something she didn’t really do in the lab because she didn’t want to distract anyone with her inane chatter and uneducated train of thought. “Some of these will evolve into animals though. All the pieces are already there, inside their DNA, or will be if given some kind of outside influence right? Like a chemical exposure or something. And what you do to one doesn’t stay there, once a single cell organism goes through it’s reproduction cycle you have two, then four, then 8 and so on, until you have thousands and millions that have been altered. They’ve been taken off their planet so they won’t affect the planetary level…well maybe…what if they were essential to some evolutionary event and now they’re gone? But what if, in thousands of years, it turns into a goo lizard without the goo to protect it and now it’s helpless and it dies out and that messes up the ecosystem, the food chains? Or what if the bacteria you’re studying gets sent back to the planet and then life never forms because of something done in the lab? How do you decide?” She stopped realizing she might have just insulted him. That’s why she should keep her questions to herself until she’d really thought them through. She went back to rubbing her hand in her lap, now more out of nerves. “I…I didn’t mean…it…it was wrong…just…seems like a big…decision to me. You know what you’re doing.”

Rand

Roman just smiled. “It’s a bacteria, Rand, at that stage of evolution, plants and animals didn’t exist yet, they both came from bacteria. The ones we collected show no difference yet, they haven’t begun to mutate into anything. It simply isn’t likely to make a difference in the scheme of things - no goo lizard’s without goo, because the lizard is as far ahead of these bacteria as starships were to cavemen, early human. Further, even.” Her questions didn’t seem to offend him and he answered with his usual patience for her questions.

~ Roman

Well that was a stupid question then. She really was curious how messing with these early bacteria might effect the development of life, but apparently that wasn’t a thing. He’d called her Rand instead of Miranda, and she was disappointed. She liked that he used her name when it was just them. She didn’t think it had anything to do with her question or anything, but she did notice. Neither did he seem annoyed by her question. He never seemed to mind her questions. This time, though, she was careful to keep her rambling thoughts to herself. She wasn’t sure if she was wording her question right. “I know there are good and harmful bacteria, but would these be less or more harmful since we are so far evolved than them? Or is that moot because it lives in different environment?”

Rand

Roman might’ve been distracted, causing him to forget that he liked to call her Miranda when they were alone. It was sort of like how she called him Roman, where to anyone else he was ‘Alden’ or ‘Commander’, even off-duty he was called Alden. He may have just called her Rand rather than Miranda because they were talking work, and as much as he loved talking about work, he was used to calling her Rand in the labs. “‘Good’ bacteria live in our bodies naturally, harmful ones invade our body. We aren’t sure exactly what effects these ones would have on a human body because obviously we aren’t going to purposefully infect someone. Or if they could.”

~ Roman