Recently in the Analog Studies Category

The Special Collection of papers in this issue of Astrobiology provide an overview of the characteristics and potential for future exploration of the Ojos del Salado volcano, located in the Andes Mountains in front of the Atacama Desert in northern Chile.

More than half of the planet's fresh water is in Antarctica. While most of it is frozen in the ice sheets, underneath the ice pools and streams of water flow into one another and into the Southern Ocean surrounding the continent.

A scene that first played out on the Moon in 1972 happened again, years later, in Hawaii. While exploring the lunar surface, Apollo 17 astronaut and geologist Harrison Schmitt spotted some bright orange soil - an important clue about the Moon's volcanic history. You can hear the excitement in his voice in recordings, but mission control in Houston couldn't see what was so remarkable in the video beamed back to Earth.

One of the great attractions of the island of Santorini, in Greece, lies in its spectacular volcanic landscape, which also contains places similar to those of Mars. A team of European and U.S. scientists has discovered it after analysing basaltic rocks collected in one of its coves.

Researchers from the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics (UTIG) have helped discover the first subglacial lakes ever found in the Canadian High Arctic.

Dale Andersen sent this via inReach on December 6, 2017 2:47:47 AM EST "Heading back to Novo in an hour nice sunny day. I'm starting my traverse, follow along at my MapShare! https://share.garmin.com/DaleAndersen " Dale sent this message from: Lat -71.332995 Lon 13.45293.

Received via Iridium 29 November 2017 4:30:03 PM EST: "Hi Keith The earlier weather forecasts were spot on and we have had blowing snow and high winds most of the day forcing us to retreat into our various tents for the day."

This message was received via Iridium on 28 November 28, 2017 8:13:28 AM EST "We are in our last week of work here at Untersee before heading back to Novo on the 6th. Hope to get in a few more dives for sample collection and imagery beneath the ice, and we have to pull experiments that are ongoing in the lake right now. Unfortunately our weather is likely to change tonight and tomorrow and Thursday may not be great for work."

Dale Andersen sent this message on 26 November 2017 at :09:26 AM EST: "We are working pretty hard while taking advantage of the nice days we have had recently. I made a dive beneath the 3.5 m thick ice-cover yesterday afternoon to collect a few sediment cores at 17 m (depth) and make observations of the lake basin in the area around the dive hole."

Dale Andersen sent this message on 23 November 2017 at 4:08:18 AM EST: "Yesterday started very nicely with sunshine and little or no winds so the morning hours were pretty productive. But by noon, katabatics let loose a barrage of winds and blowing snow that shut us down for most activities in the afternoon."