The Andromeda Strain (1971)
Dr. Hall (James Olson) discovers that the Andromeda Strain can only thrive within (and kill) infected people whose blood chemistry is in a narrow Ph level. Dutton (David Wayne) & Leavitt (Kate Reid) also learn that the Andromeda organism can survive in any environment because it can feed on energy in any form — including a nuclear explosion. (Levitt also learned of Andromeda’s weaknesses, but unfortunately and unbeknownst to everybody, she was an epileptic whose seizures were triggered by the flashing computer displays like the one that showed successful neutralization of Andromeda.)
Luckily these discoveries are made before the infected town is nuked. Unfortunately, Andromeda mutates into a form that dissolves the safety seals — triggering the lab’s nuclear self-destruct mechanism. Hall breaks through the seals and, after getting gassed and lasered, he just about makes it. Using Hall’s knowledge of Andromeda’s chemistry, the Americans seed rain clouds, and kill the bug, though we’re led to believe that the bug will remain on Earth, dormant until the day it mutates into a more resistant and virulent form, or until scientists like Hill “accidentally” obtain an even more dangerous bug from space with which to accidentally wipe out life on earth.
We never find out why the organism got named Andromeda.
— Thanks to Ari Rottenberg!
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