Starship Asterisk*

If one thinks more loosely - in terms of [i]possible[/i] life, not just human - one can imagine that we are already seeing such things in just such clouds as pictured in this APOD.

On another note, here we thought the L.A. smog was bad... Imagine being able to see a smog cloud from 20 million light years distant! Someone needs to call the Galactic Environmental Protection Agency! :)

-Noel

Apologies if this is right off topic, but:
http://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/starsgalaxies/spitzer-20060316.html

Would it be concievably possible for the gas in, say, a solarsystem / galaxy sized region of space to be packed dense enough to remove the need for a spacesuit? (perhaps following some farfetched huge cataclysmic even like multiple super novae..?)