Poisoning the Savasku

John Atkinson schrieb:
> How long after we start dissecting Savasku corpses
> will it be before we cook up some equivelant of bug
> spray?  

Good question. It's rather hard to test a poison on a dead body. 

If you can keep Savasku cells or organs alive in a lab, you could start
testing substance against it. But just culturing Savasku cells may be
hard.

And something that works in the lab may not work on a living animal - a
common problem in testing medicines.

You can use some brute-force poison in large quantities. But for your
purpose you need something more sophisticated that kills quickly in
small doses. A Nerve Agent or similar.

Comparing present-day research progress, I would say something around a
decade or two.

> It seems to me that Mr. Organic Spaceships
> could be sucking if we get a decent delivery system. 

Another problem. A 'spray can' against spaceships ? The outer skin will
be pretty impermeable. After all, it operates in a vacuum. 

Another question is how the poison will propagate in the body. Can
sections be isolated so that only a small part is killed ?

> Of course for boarding usage, just round up a bunch of
> those tranq guns that biologist types use on large
> mammals.  

Probably also a good idea against the spaceships. A shell that
penetrates the armour and sprays the poison inside.

Not so sure of it as an infantry weapon. It would have to be a very
quick-acting poison. Or a bullet with good ballistic stopping power
that also carries the poison.

> If their biology is alien enough, it might
> even be something that's completely non-toxic to
> humans.  

A lot of stuff that poisons other terran organisms is quite harmless to
humans. On the other hand, there are some biocides that will kill
anything.

Greetings