A Belgian research team was able to prove that Astrophage reacts to magnetic fields, but only sometimes. Other times, it seems to ignore magnetic fields entirely, no matter how powerful. Still, the Belgians were able to (very inconsistently) steer Astrophage around by putting it in a magnetic field and changing the field’s orientation. Was that useful? No idea. At this point the world was just collecting data.
A researcher in Paraguay showed that ants will get disoriented when they’re within a few centimeters of Astrophage. Was that useful? Okay, that one probably wasn’t useful. But it was interesting.
Most notably, a group in Perth sacrificed one of their Astrophage and did a detailed analysis on all the organelles inside. They found DNA and mitochondria. In any other situation, this would have been the most important discovery of the century. Alien life—indisputably alien—had DNA and mitochondria!
