Why alien life might look purple

When inspecting the cosmos for potentially habitable worlds, scientists have long looked for the color green. Green is the fundamental color of life on Earth, after all. But what if life on faraway planets wasn’t green at all? In fact, what if it were purple? In a study published in April in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, scientists zoom in on purple bacteria—these violet and magenta hued microorganisms are found in some of the most extreme environments …