NASA Astrobiology Institute

AbSciCon 2014 Postponed until 2015

The Astrobiology Program has been the sole source of funding for biennial AbSciCons from their beginning. However, restrictions on federal spending on conferences and budget limitations due to sequestration have led us to determine that the Program cannot support an AbSciCon next year. We regret this decision as much as you do, and it was a hard one to make.

Astrobiology Program Strategy Process Update

Betcha didn't know that the unofficial motto of NASA's Astrobiology Program was "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of Congressional paralysis stays these scientists from the swift completion of their appointed webinars" ;-)

NASA Cooperative Agreement Notice: NASA Astrobiology Institute Cycle 7

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Science Mission Directorate (SMD) is releasing a Cooperative Agreement Notice (NNH13ZDA017C) entitled NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI) - Cycle 7.

Astrobiology Strategic Plan Milestone

The NASA Astrobiology Strategy process has reached an important milestone. The concept documents, which were created at the Wallops Island workshop, are now ready for public comment.

NASA Astrobiology Strategic Plan Update

The 2014 Astrobiology Strategic Plan is now under construction. It has involved the community in online and face-to-face discussions.

Notice of release of draft text of the NASA Astrobiology Institute

Cycle 7 Cooperative Agreement Notice NNH13ZDA010J: On or about July 3, 2013 The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Science Mission Directorate is releasing a Draft Cooperative Agreement Notice (CAN) soliciting team-based proposals for membership in the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI) for community review and comment.

Developing a New Astrobiology Roadmap

The NASA Astrobiology Program has begun the process of developing a new Astrobiology Roadmap to chart the future directions of astrobiology research. During the month of May, NASA hosted a series of on-line hangouts and discussions focusing on broad themes in astrobiology.

Lewis and Clark Fund for Exploration and Field Research in Astrobiology 2013 Selections

The NAI is pleased to announce selections for the 2013 Lewis and Clark Fund for Exploration and Field Research in Astrobiology.

Astrobiology Program Early Career Collaboration Award 2013 Selections

The NASA Astrobiology Program Early Career Collaboration Award offers research-related travel support for graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. Applicants are encouraged to use these resources to circulate among two or more research teams, however any travel that is critical for the applicant's research will be considered.

Minority Institution Research Support (MIRS) Program 2013 Selections

The Astrobiology Program has selected 5 faculty members from minority serving institutions to conduct research in the labs of NASA Astrobiology Program researchers as part of the Minority Institution Research Support (MIRS) program during 2013.

Astrobiology Roadmapping: Be a part of the future of Astrobiology

Be a part of the future of Astrobiology! It's time to chart the future directions of astrobiology research and you can participate. During the month of May, NASA will be hosting a series of on-line hangouts and discussions focusing on broad themes in astrobiology: Planetary Conditions for Life, Prebiotic Evolution, Early Evolution of Life and the Biosphere, Evolution of Advanced Life, and Astrobiology for Solar Systems Exploration.

NASA Seeks New Director for the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI)

The ideal candidate will be an internationally recognized scientist with proven experience in leading large, multi-disciplinary, multi-site research programs or projects, possessed with a vision for leading the Institute into the future. Established in 1998 as part of NASA's Astrobiology Program, the NAI is a collaboration between NASA, US academic institutions, and foreign institutions, governments and research organizations - and is composed of over 800 US scientists and hundreds of researchers abroad. The NAI, currently headquartered at NASA Ames Research Center in the heart of California's Silicon Valley, functions as a virtual institute, its members linked by modern information technologies.

2012 Early Career Research Focus Group

For the past four years, early career scientists have organized a Research Focus Group (RFG), preceding the Astrobiology Graduate Student conference (AbGradCon) in which participants are grouped into interdisciplinary groups to develop original research projects, draft a written proposal, peer-review the proposals of other groups and then vote on the best proposals.

For 2012 the RFG was held at USC's Wrigley Institute on Catalina Island, CA in late August. The group selected the following proposals:

1st choice: Characterization of Residual Biosignatures in Arctic Glacial Environments: A Remote Sensing Study for Biosignature Detection on Mars and Icy Worlds
Group 8: Julia DeMarines, Ian Foster, Chester Harman, Shana Kendall, Afshin Khan

2nd choice: The Autocatalytic Generation of Amino Acid Homochirality under Planetary Atmospheres
Group 3: Michael Chaffin, Amanda Evans, Rebecca McCauley, Marika Tarasashvili

3rd choice: Microbial and geochemical characterization of soils interfacing with physicochemical extremes from the hyper-arid core of the Atacama Desert - a potential key to understanding the evolution and functionality of life in a Mars-analog environment
Group 7: Anthony Friedline, Graham Lau, Shannon Soucy, Madhan Tirumalai

Congratulations to the winning proposal teams!!

NAI Announces Selection of New Teams

Please join the NAI in welcoming five new research teams into the Institute--the University of Washington; Massachusetts Institute of Technology; the University of Wisconsin, Madison; the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign; and the University of Southern California.

"The intellectual scope of astrobiology is breathtaking, from understanding how our planet went from lifeless to living, to understanding how life has adapted to Earth's harshest environments, to exploring other worlds with the most advanced technologies to search for signs of life," said Carl Pilcher, Director of the NAI. "The new teams cover that breadth of astrobiology, and by coming together in the NAI, they will make the connections between disciplines and organizations that stimulate fundamental scientific advances."

"How would we know if an extrasolar planet were able to support life or had life on it already?" asks the University of Washington's Virtual Planetary Laboratory (VPL) team, led by Victoria Meadows. Using interdisciplinary computational models, VPL examines life's observable impact on a planetary environment, considering a variety of metabolisms, planetary compositions, and host stars. The result of this team effort will be a library of astronomical biosignatures against which spectral and photometric data returned by missions such as JWST can be cross-referenced to check for signs of life.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology team led by Roger Summons asks, "If we cannot detect complex life on Earth when it first arose, how can we hope to detect life on other planets?" This team examines the history of complex life by studying Earth's rock record, particularly fossil, isotopic, and molecular evidence. Its focus is taphonomy--the combination of processes and conditions that preserve biological signatures. The team uses the insights it develops to guide how and where to look for evidence for life elsewhere, particularly at Gale Crater on Mars, site of the Curiosity Rover Mission.

The team at the University of Wisconsin, led by Clark Johnson, seeks to enhance our overall capability to identify and interpret specific biosignatures and the ancient environments in which they formed. Focusing in particular on how interaction of life's biomolecules with rock substrates can affect the detection of those signatures, the team will develop new instrumentation for the identification of biomolecules, and integrate techniques such as genomics and organic and isotope geochemistry. They will also approach the characterization of life's past environments by mineral proxy, studying ancient clays, iron-silica oxides, and carbonates to infer paleoenvironmental conditions and biological processes.

The University of Illinois team, led by Nigel Goldenfeld, builds upon the research of Carl Woese, a team member who revolutionized our understanding of the diversity of life on Earth through his pioneering studies of ribosomal DNA. The team will probe beyond the last universal common ancestor at the root of the tree of life, delving into that early space where it is thought life was dominated by collective phenomena. The team seeks to identify general principles underlying the emergence and subsequent evolution of living matter, a field called "Universal Biology." Using field and laboratory investigations into collective community dynamics as well as theoretical and computational studies of co-evolution in both natural and digital life systems, the team will inform our view of how life emerged, both here and elsewhere in the Universe.

The University of Southern California team led by Jan Amend is focused on the intraterrestrials, a vast community of micro-organisms that make up Earth's subsurface biosphere. They ask, "How do we search for microbes in the subsurface?" They answer, "By drilling, of course!" Their investigations begin with drilling operations in unique and distinct geological environments, and continue with the deployment of new in situ instruments for biomass detection directly into the boreholes. The team will then utilize novel techniques to culture the notoriously unculturable intraterrestrials and study the energy flow in these communities.

These five new teams join ten continuing teams led by the University of Hawaii, Arizona State University, the Carnegie Institution of Washington, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the Pennsylvania State University, the Georgia Institute of Technology and teams at NASA Ames Research Center and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, as well as two teams at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

NASA Selects Science Teams for Astrobiology Institute

NASA has awarded five-year grants totaling almost $40 million to five research teams to study the origin, evolution, distribution, and future of life in the universe.

The newly selected teams are from the University of Washington; Massachusetts Institute of Technology; University of Wisconsin, Madison; University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign; and University of Southern California. Average funding to the teams is almost $8 million each. The interdisciplinary teams will become members of the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI), headquartered at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif.

"These research teams join the NASA Astrobiology Institute at an exciting time for NASA's exploration programs," said John Grunsfeld, astronaut and associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. "With the Curiosity rover preparing to investigate the potential habitability of Mars and the Kepler mission discovering planets outside our solar system, these research teams will help provide the critical interdisciplinary expertise needed to interpret data from these missions and plan future astrobiology-focused missions."

AbSciCon 2012 Talks Now Available Online

Talks presented at the Astrobiology Science Conference 2012 are now available at http://abscicon2012.arc.nasa.gov/abstracts/. You'll find the Adobe Connect recordings and abstracts organized on par with the AbSciCon Program. For any queries, contact us at @ abscicon@gmail.com [Source: NAI]

Astrobiologists Receive Accolades

Please join the NASA Astrobiology Program in congratulating five scientists on their recent awards and accolades! Sue Brantley from Penn State was elected into the National Academy of Sciences in May, 2012; Dave Des Marais will receive the 2012 Alfred Treibs Award from the Geochemcial Society for achievements in organic chemistry; Lisa Kaltenegger of the Max Planck Institute received the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize from Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft in May, 2012 given to outstanding early career scientists in Germany; Sara Seager from MIT was awarded the Raymond and Beverly Sackler Prize in the Physical Sciences from Tel Aviv University in June, 2012 for her brilliant theoretical studies, including analysis of the atmospheres and internal compositions of extra-solar planets; and Jim Kasting was awarded the Evan Pugh Professorship at Penn State, given to faculty members who are nationally or internationally acknowledged leaders in their fields of research or creative activity, have demonstrated significant leadership in raising the standards of the University with respect to teaching, research or creativity, and service, and demonstrate excellent teaching skills with undergraduate and graduate students who have subsequently achieved distinction in their field. [Source: NAI]

The NAI Selects Fellows for the Astrobiology Minority Institution Research Support (MIRS) Program

2012 MIRS Fellows are:

1. Dr. Prabhakar Misra, from Howard University, will conduct fluorescence and Raman spectroscopy of organic molecules of relevance to the spectral library of potential contaminants for the Mars Science Laboratory mission, in the laboratory of Paul Mahaffy at NASA Goddard.

2. Dr. Hany Sobhi, from Coppin State University will work with Natasha Johnson, at NASA Goddard, to investigate the Fischer -Tropsch-Type (FTT) Catalysis reaction mechanism for the production of insoluble and volatile organic molecules in the protostellar nebula.

Please join us in welcoming Prabhakar and Hany to the NAI.

More information about the MIRS program can be found at http://astrobiology.nasa.gov/nai/funding/nai-minority-institution-research-support

Recorded Sessions from AbSciCon Now Available

Several sessions at the 2012 Astrobiology Science Conference were broadcast live via Adobe Connect and recorded. An archive of talks from 18 sessions is now available for viewing online via the AbSciCon website. For more information: http://abscicon2012.arc.nasa.gov/recorded_talks/

2012 Lewis and Clark Selections

The NAI is pleased to announce selections for the 2012 Lewis and Clark Fund for Exploration and Field Research in Astrobiology.

1. Timothy Gallagher, travel to Michigan, Minnesota and Ontario, to study "Life on Land during the Mesoproterozoic: Evidence from the Midcontinent Rift System"

2. Cara Harwood, travel to Nevada, to examine "Thrombolites as Records of Microbial-metazoan Ecosystems in Cambrian Carbonates of the Southern Great Basin, United States"

3. Jena Johnson, travel to South Africa to investigate "Manganese and the Evolution of Oxygenic Photosynthesis"

4. Cassandra Marnocha, travel to Sweden to study the "Geomicrobiology of Rock Coatings from Karkevagge, Swedish Lapland"

5. Roy Price, travel to New Caledonia, "Expanding Frontiers for Origin of Life Research: Serpentinite-hosted Shallow Hydrothermal Vents"

6. Elizabeth Sibert, travel to Italy to examine "Ichthyoliths Across the Kpg [Cretaceous-paleogene] Boundary: Response of Pelagic Consumers to a Mass Extinction"

7. Erik Sperling, travel to Canada, to study "Oxygen, Ecology, and the Cambrian Radiation of Animals: Insights into the Origin of Complex Life from the Mackenzie Mountains, Northwest Territories, Canada"

8. Elizabeth Wilbanks, travel to Massachusetts to investigate "A Sulfurous Symbiosis: the Dynamic Metatranscriptome of Pinkberries in the Sippewissett Salt Marsh"

The American Philosophical Society and the NASA Astrobiology Institute have partnered to promote the continued exploration of the world around us through a new program of research grants in support of astrobiological field studies undertaken by graduate students, postdocs, and early-career scientists and scholars who are affiliated with U.S. institutions.

For more information: http://astrobiology.nasa.gov/nai/funding/lewis-and-clark/