The autonomous, solar-powered Zoe, which became the first robot to map microbial life during a 2005 field expedition in Chile's Atacama Desert, is heading back to the world's driest desert this month on a NASA astrobiology mission led by Carnegie Mellon University and the SETI Institute. This time, Zoe is equipped with a one-meter drill to search for subsurface life.
Presenter: Peter T. Doran (University of Illinois, Chicago)
May 21, 2012 11:00 AM Pacific
The extreme cold and dry environment of the McMurdo Dry Valleys have made it one of the better analogs on Earth for Martian environments, present and past, and the thick ice ice-covered lakes have been used as analogs for aquatic environments on icy worlds. In fact, some of the earliest field research performed in the dry valleys was a direct result of the Mariner 4 space probe which orbited Mars in July 1965. Images returned from this mission for the first time showed Mars to be a cratered, cold and dry planet. The revelations from Mariner 4 drove Norm Harowitz from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory to be perhaps the first to consider the dry valley soils as suitable models for what the surface of Mars may be like.
Robert Falcon Scott was the first to explore this region in 1903 and pronounced it lifeless. He was only there for a brief time and so can't be blamed for his quick judgment. Modern science has shown how the dry valleys actually offer a habitat for some hearty organisms. Much of the knowledge build up about this ecosystem has come from both NSF and NASA-funded science. The NSF established a Long Term Ecological Research site here in 1992 and numerous NASA astrobiology projects have advanced science in the Dry valleys before and since. This talk will look back at some seminal work carried out under the auspices of the NASA Exobiology Program and summarize results of some recent astrobiological research in the dry valleys, focusing on the perennial ice-covered, closed-basin lakes.
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Interested in helping scientists pinpoint where to look for signs of life on Mars? Now you can, with an exciting new citizen science website called MAPPER (getmapper.com) that was launched in conjunction with the Pavilion Lake Research Project's 2011 field season.
The Pavilion Lake Research Project (PLRP, pavilionlake.com), which is supported by NASA and the Canadian Space Agency, has been investigating the underwater environment of Pavilion and Kelly Lake in British Columbia, Canada with DeepWorker submersible vehicles (Nuytco Ltd, nuytco.com) since 2008. Now with MAPPER, you can work side-by-side with NASA scientists to explore the bottom of these lakes from the perspective of a DeepWorker pilot.
The PLRP team makes use of DeepWorker subs to explore and document freshwater carbonate formations known as microbialites that thrive in Pavilion and Kelly Lake. Many scientists believe that a better understanding of how and where these rare microbialite formations develop will lead to deeper insights into where signs of life may be found on Mars and beyond. To investigate microbialite formation in detail, terabytes of video footage and photos of the lake bottom are recorded by PLRP's DeepWorker sub pilots. This data must be analyzed to determine what types of features can be found in different parts of the lake. Ultimately, detailed maps can be generated to help answer questions like "how does microbialite texture and size vary with depth?" and "why do microbialites grow in certain parts of the lake but not in others?". But before these questions can be answered, all the data must be analyzed.
A little bit of Mars - a 140 square metre Marsyard - has been recreated in the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney, complete with two rovers and a working laboratory for space robotics and astrobiology researchers. The public exhibition is part of the Pathways to Space project led by Dr. Carol Oliver at the Australian Centre for Astrobiology at the University of New South Wales, Sydney. There are three other consortium members - the Australian Centre for Field Robotics at the University of Sydney (which designed and built the rovers), the Powerhouse Museum, which is Australia's largest science museum, and industry partner Cisco.
Pathways to Space has been funded with a million dollar grant from the Australian Federal Government's Australian Space Science Research Program, matched by a total of $1.5M in kind from the project partners. A high school student-focused education program is at the heart of the project. The key objective - to be tested by longitudinal research - is to encourage 50 to 100 students from more than 2000 participants to go onto space-related university courses and, eventually, space-related careers.
The project also has the facility to allow schools across Australia - and potentially overseas - to participate using its TelePresence system and unique rover driving and exploration software to draw in any school with a standard video system. A monthly forum is planned for students with guests from around the world sharing their Visions of Mars and answering student questions via TelePresence.
For more information: http://www.pathwaystospace.org
Liza Coe: Many people who have not been to Death Valley think of it as an inhospitable patch of sand in the middle of a desert. Although it is one of the driest areas on the planet, the land supports so much life.
Interdisciplinary studies are an important way to bring together many concepts. Much of education today is very segregated, especially in high school: history, math, biology, earth science, and everything else is learned separately. However, it has been demonstrated that interdisciplinary studies can grab and maintain students' interests as well as helping them retain knowledge longer.
All of the places that we visited today can be used as an interdisciplinary site. We started off at Scotty's Castle and along the ride we noticed many significant geological formations. The history of Scotty's Castle can be tied into the time period, with a lesson about the other economic and historical events that happened in the 1930s and 1940s. Also, along the ride, the types minerals that are abundant in the desert area can be discussed, and students can learn how to identify geological features, such as alluvial fans and fault lines.
We then headed to the Ubehebe craters, which are a great analog to formations to look for on Mars. These craters are Maar craters, where magma meets groundwater. The water table boils and released pressure in a volcanic eruption. The craters are what are left over after such eruptions. Many students may believe a crater is only from an asteroid or from a mountainous volcano, so this site affords an opportunity to learn about all sorts of volcanic features.We ended our long day at Badwater Basin, which is one of the lowest places in the world, at -282 feet. This used to be a sea, and this place could be used to talk about watersheds and how desertification occurs over time. We can incorporate math into this by looking at negative numbers, and students can compare the sea levels of the lowest places in the world. This was a very long but rewarding day as we got to take in all the beauty of Death Valley.
Date/Time: Wednesday, December 1, 2010 11:00AM Pacific
Presenter: David Gilichinsky (Russian Academy of Sciences)
Abstract: The terrestrial cryosphere is the only widespread and rich depository of viable ancient organisms on Earth. The age of the isolates corresponds to the longevity of the frozen state of the embedding strata, with the oldest known dating back to the late Pliocene. If life ever existed on frozen extraterrestrial bodies such as Mars, traces might have been preserved and could be found at depth within Martian ice or permafrost. Permafrost on Earth and Mars vary in age, from a few million years on Earth to a few billion years on Mars. Such a difference in time scale would have a significant impact on the possibility of preserving life on Mars, which is why the longevity of life forms preserved within terrestrial permafrost can only be considered an approximate model for Mars.
I will focus on one of the terrestrial environments which are close to Mars in age - active volcanoes in permafrost areas. Here the age of volcanic deposits frozen after eruption is much younger than the age of surrounding permafrost. The same processes (past eruptions of Martian volcanoes) periodically burned through the frozen strata and formed the thermal and water oases. Simultaneously, products of eruptions (lava, rock debris, scoria, ash) rose from the depths to the surface and froze. The age of these frozen volcanic deposits is thus much younger than the age of the surrounding permafrost. Images taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera on board the ESA Mars Express mission discovered young volcanoes 2-15 Myr old on Mars. In other words, the age of the youngest Martian volcanoes date back to the age of volcanoes on Earth.
Culture- and culture-independent methods show the presence of viable thermophilic and hyperthermophilic bacteria and their genes within pyroclastic frozen material on Earth. These bacteria and archeae have not been found in permafrost outside the areas of active volcanism. The presence of thermophilic communities in frozen ash and scoria raise questions about the origin of these microorganisms and their life style in such environments. The only way for thermophiles to get into frozen pyroclastic material is through deposition during eruption. In other words, catastrophic geological events may transport thermophiles from the depths to the surface and these thermophiles may survive at subzero temperatures.
Such terrestrial microbial communities might serve as a model for Mars, particularly for young Martian volcanoes that date back to ages close to those for terrestrial volcanoes. To explore these hypotheses we are characterizing different volcanic microbial communities on Earth within volcanic permafrost. One such area of active volcanism is the Klyuchevskaya Volcano Group (55*'N, 160*E) on the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Russian Far-East, where mountainous permafrost predominates from the elevations ~1000 m asl and up. I will describe our studies of microorganisms isolated from this area.
For more information and participation instructions: http://astrobiology.nasa.gov/nai/seminars/detail/184 [Source: NAI Newsletter]
7-14 February 2011
Marrakech, Morocco
Abstract Submission Deadline: 7 January 2011
Sponsored by the European Space Agency (ESA) Topical Team, Geomicrobiology for Space Settlement and Exploration.
Organizers: Charles Cockell (Open University, UK), Oliver Angerer (ESA), Gian Gabriele Ori (IRSPS, Italy and Ibn Battuta Centre, Morocco), Kamal Taj-Eddine (Universite Cady Ayyad and Ibn Battuta Centre, Morocco)
Geobiology in Space Exploration will be a meeting with talks and discussions that aim to cover the full range of the contributions of geobiology to space exploration and settlement. It will have two core purposes: 1) To contribute to building the community of people working in geobiology and applying the discipline to themes in space sciences and exploration; and 2) To develop a strategic document on the range of geobiology applications and possible space missions for ESA. The meeting will begin midday on Monday the 7th and will finish on Wednesday the 9th and will be held at the Universite Cadi Ayyad (Morocco). The meeting will then be followed by a voluntary field trip for interested participants.
The "Martha T. Muse Prize for Science and Policy in Antarctica" is a US $100,000 unrestricted award presented to an individual in the fields of Antarctic science or policy that has demonstrated potential for sustained and significant contributions that will enhance the understanding and/or preservation of Antarctica. The Prize is inspired by Martha T. Muse's passion for Antarctica and is intended to be a legacy of the International Polar Year 2007-2008. The prize-winner can be from any country and work in any field of Antarctic science or policy. The goal is to provide recognition of the important work being done by the individual and to call attention to the significance of understanding Antarctica in a time of change. A web site with further details, including the process of nomination and selection of the Prize recipients is available at www.museprize.org .
The Prize is awarded by the Tinker Foundation (http://foundationcenter.org/grantmaker/tinker/) and administered by the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR). (http://www.scar.org/)
Note the deadline for nominations is the 15th of October. [Source: NAI Newsletter]
The 39+/-2Ma Haughton impact structure on Devon Island comprises a thick target succession of sedimentary rocks, mainly carbonates. The carbonates contain pre-impact organic matter, including fossil biological markers. Haughton is located in an area where no major thermal event has affected the sedimentary succession after heating caused by impact. This makes Haughton uniquely suitable for studies concerning the preservation of fossil biological markers following an impact event.
This amendment replaces the draft text in Appendix C.24 entitled "Moon and Mars Analog Mission Activities" with the final text. NASA Moon and Mars Analog Mission Activities (MMAMA) research addresses the need for integrated interdisciplinary field experiments as an integral part of preparation for planned human and robotic missions to the Moon and Mars. The focus of this program is on providing high-fidelity scientific investigations, scientific input, and science operations constraints in the context of planetary field campaigns. Funding provided in this program element is intended to enable researchers to conduct scientific investigations and integrate their instruments, projects, and/or protocols into field activities designed to help NASA plan for future exploration of the Moon, Mars, and other planetary bodies with both robots and humans.
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