When talking about alien plants, most people will instinctively think of the insect tree, which is the kind sent to the earth by aliens. Only a very few people know that the kind on the earth is actually just a member of the insect tree family.
Ye Han is one of them. As early as when the First Fleet was on an expedition to Jupiter, he had observed photos of Io at close range. At that time, Io was still in a global freeze and could not see its surface.
But when the Second Fleet arrived at Jupiter, Europa had turned into a lush and habitable planet, with large forests visible on the surface.
Combining the prisoner logs, it is not difficult to find that after the first expedition ended in failure, Europa quickly recovered, plants grew rapidly, and it did not take long to cover the planet's surface.
However, at that time, the plants on Io were still mainly white and brown, and green was almost invisible. Based on the analysis of the captive diaries, it was likely that aliens were preparing for Io's breakaway, and they were sowing seeds on the surface of the planet.
A large number of insect trees, thus harvesting a large amount of food in a very short period of time, laid a solid material foundation for Europa to fly to the earth.
Many biologists believe that although alien plants are not green, there must be something similar in function to chlorophyll in their cells.
However, this view had little market, because Io was still near Jupiter at the time, and the light received there was only 4% of that of the Earth, but the insect trees grew fast and well.
It can grow smoothly even in the absence of light. No matter how you look at it, insect trees do not grow by photosynthesis.
According to human beings' understanding of the biological world, the insect tree should be a special plant that uses chemical energy synthesis to grow. However, human beings' understanding of biological organisms is limited to the earth. God knows if alien organisms have other ways of growing.
There are also scholars who are studying what will happen if chlorophyll is added to insect trees, but before the results of this research are available, various countries immediately ban this research to prevent those scientific lunatics from creating new insect trees with unknown abilities.
From then on, no research institution was allowed to conduct research on modifying insect trees, and this is still the case today.
But no one expected that after Europa recovered again, the first plants growing on the surface would actually be green!
Now, one month later, the plants of Year 0 of Jupiter are no longer what they were when they first sprouted. Instead, they have formed a lush green ocean, including patches of grassland and large shrubs. It is only a matter of time before large forests will appear.
.
Li Shili looked at the vegetation all over Europa and couldn't help but sigh. There are still snow-capped mountains and deserts on the earth, but there are green plants everywhere on Europa. If the time was not too short and the height was not high enough, it would be even more dense than tropical rainforests.
Tropical rainforest.
It’s not surprising when you think about it. Aliens are best at tinkering with living things. What does it matter if they modify a few plants to adapt to deserts or other extreme environments?
He even came up with an idea that should never occur: It would be great if he could get special plants cultivated by aliens. In that case, all the Gobi Desert on the earth could be turned into oases...
Of course, he was just thinking about it. Plants modified by aliens must not have problems adapting to the environment. Instead, he should worry about the consequences of alien plants invading the earth.
Furthermore, Gobi and deserts are now one of the important means for humans to resist swarms of insects. Just imagine, if the Sahara Desert was turned into a Sahara oasis, how many giant insects could be raised? How many giant ants would have to rush into the oasis-like desert?
, all the way to North Africa?
Once upon a time, the Gobi Desert was an insurmountable chasm between human civilizations. So far, they are still areas that the insect swarm cannot conquer.
This reminds Li Shili of a sentence: Feng shui takes turns!
At this time, an unusually conspicuous light suddenly flashed on the screen. This light came from the middle of Europa's northern hemisphere. From the perspective of the battleship, it was a lush grassland and there could not be any reflective material.
Speaking of reflective materials, we must talk about Europa. Three-quarters of its surface is covered by water. If you observe it from the right angle, the sunlight reflected by the water surface will be extremely dazzling, making it the brightest thing in the sky.
stars!
This is not a joke, nor is it a literati's writing style, but a real fact - Jupiter is located 60 million kilometers in front of the Earth, and its orbit around the sun is very similar to the Earth's orbit, and the positions of the two planets have hardly changed.
Every clear dawn, those who get up early can see an extremely bright star in the eastern sky. People with good eyesight can even find that the star is just a small crescent moon at the beginning.
The footsteps gradually turned into a semicircle, and the brightness became higher and higher, until at dawn, its light was obscured by the rising sun.
And the brightness of this star does not always remain the same. Sometimes it is brighter and sometimes dimmer, but no matter what time, it is much brighter than the morning star!
This star is Jupiter. Observations have found that its brightness is caused by its rotation. When the land faces the earth, the brightness is lower. When the ocean faces the earth, the brightness increases significantly. The brightest part always only has a crescent line. That is
Sunlight reflected from the curved sea surface!
When Venus transits the sun, it is closer to the earth, but no matter what time it is, Venus is not as bright as Jupiter. This is because Venus is wrapped in a thick atmosphere and is not as reflective as the water surface; secondly, when it transits the sun
At that time, Venus was between the Earth and the Sun, and no matter how bright it was, it couldn't be as bright as the Sun.
So today's Europa is definitely the brightest star in the sky.
Of course, it is of no use whether it is the brightest or the darkest, and no one appreciates Europa's unique reflection. Everyone's first reaction when seeing it is to immediately think of aliens and giant insects.
The reflection that Li Shili saw was not on the water, so it immediately attracted his attention. At the same time, other people's eyes were also attracted by this flash of light.
Just a few seconds later, the flash appeared again, and Ye Han frowned: "This is not a natural phenomenon, magnify this point for me!"
The bridge officer in charge of the observation immediately used the device to zoom in on the screen. The screen flashed several times, and a grassland appeared on the screen. Several aliens standing on the grassland looking up to the sky could be vaguely seen.
"Continue!" Ye Han yelled suddenly.
The screen was zoomed in several more times, and the group of aliens occupied half of the screen. Everyone finally saw what was going on there: among the aliens, there was an unusually short alien, with a group of aliens lying in front of him.
The giant insect is only bigger than a millstone. The shell on the giant insect's back is crystal clear, like a bright gem, and it is extra large.
