Did NASA botch the "alien life" announcement?

It seems that the answer is "yes":

Now the story is out, and we can all see what Felisa Wolfe-Simon and her team report in their Science paper. They do indeed claim that they have isolated bacteria able to use arsenic to grow, incorporating the element into their molecules rather than phosphorus.


This is an astounding example of an extremophile – an organism able to survive in a hostile, extreme environment. However, the strain is still undeniably a bacterium – it sits firmly on our tree of life and offers no suggestion of an independent origin. What's more, although it does seem able to incorporate arsenic, the organism still grows considerably better when provided with phosphorus.

We don't know yet how arsenic gets incorporated into its molecules, and we don't know how these arsenic-containing molecules operate. So while undeniably an incredible demonstration of the adaptability of life, this cell is not evidence for a separate origin of life on Earth, it's certainly not an alien life form, and it presents more questions than it answers.

The more interesting tale here, I think, is how this engine of speculation revved up as the story played out. Nasa certainly hadn't over-hyped anything: they posted a very modest, if somewhat enigmatic, notification of a press conference.