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South Pole-Aitken Basin Sample Return And eXploration (SPARX) Science Definition Team Report
[astro-ph.IM] Sample return from South Pole-Aitken Basin (SPA) on the Moon has been recognized as the highest priority lunar science mission for well over two decades, appearing as a recommended New Frontiers class mission in the two previous Planetary Science Decadal Survey documents (2003-2012 New Frontiers, 2013-2022 Visions and Voyages), and as a prioritized mission…
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PAHSPECS: JWST/MIRI Spectroscopy Of PAHs at Cosmic Noon
[astro-ph.GA] The physical conditions of the interstellar medium (ISM) are thought to differ greatly at…
Looking Inside Living Antarctic Cells For The First Time
[British Antarctic Survey] Cambridge engineers have built the first microscope to see inside living cells…
Computational Modeling Of An RNA-peptide World
[biorxiv.org] Emergence and evolution of functional RNA and protein structures are the central problems for…
Earth As A Potential Source Of Llife For Europa’s Subsurface Ocean
The paper discusses the possibility of dust particles containing living bacteria ejected from Earth reaching Europa and landing on its surface. It is shown that, taking certain factors into account, over a period of 30 − 80 Myr (the estimated age of Europa’s ocean), Jupiter’s moon would have been impacted…
Keep readingDust To Dust: Prospects For Passive Technosignatures As Relics Of ETI
Technological societies are separated in time, not just space — that is the lesson of the Drake equation. Might the best way to seek them be to find technosignatures that persist long after their creators? I present work I and my collaborators have done on the idea of passive technosignatures,…
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Habitable Zones
Astronomy & Telescopes
Atmospheres, Climate, Weather
Optical Constants of Photochemical Haze Analogs in N2-CH4-CO Atmospheres from 0.4 to 28.6 μm
[astro-ph.EP] Photochemical hazes play an important role in shaping the spectra and radiative balance of N2-dominated planetary atmospheres. We present newly acquired FTIR and retrieved optical constants (N=n+ik) of laboratory-generated haze analogs from N2/CH4 and N2/CH4/CO gas mixtures under plasma discharge conditions. The retrievals use particle densities newly measured for the CH4-series and previously published…
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On-demand Microfluidic Synthesis Of Silver Nanoparticles For SERS Detection Of Organic Compounds: A Preliminary Feasibility Study For Astrobiology Applications
[Spectrochimica Acta Part A] The detection of organic molecules at trace concentration levels remains a critical challenge for astrobiology research. While Raman spectroscopy is a…
Tricorder Tech: What A Spacefaring Arctic Microbe Reveals About Life in Alien Oceans
[ISS National Laboratory] It lives in places where life should not exist. In the brine channels that thread through Arctic sea ice, it survives temperatures…
Tricorder Tech: New Handheld Device Maps Chemical Composition Using Infrared Light
[Optica] Researchers have developed a compact, handheld mid-infrared imaging spectrometer that can produce high-resolution chemical maps of a sample without using any stains or labels.…
Imaging & Spectroscopy
Europa Smooth Plains Formation: A SPH Cryovolcanic Model
[astro-ph.EP] Cryovolcanism is a fundamental geodynamical process that has been observed on several icy moons. Europa stands out as a primary target for investigating potential…
High-resolution Optical Spectroscopy Reveals The Distinctive Volatile Composition Of The Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS
[astro-ph.EP] Comets preserve volatile material from the early stages of planetary-system formation. The discovery of the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS enables a direct comparison between a…
Rotational Spectroscopy And Astronomical Search Of Propane-1-thiol (CH3CH2CH2SH) And Propane-2-thiol ((CH3)2CHSH)
[astro-ph.GA] This study focuses on propanethiol (or propyl mercaptan, C3H7SH), a sulfur analogue of propanol and a key target for investigating interstellar sulfur chemistry. We…
Biosignatures & Paleobiology
Is A Nearby Advanced Alien Civilization Out There Waiting To Pounce On Earth? Unlikely, Says New Study
[Northern Arizona University] Science fiction suggests that life on other planets, if it exists, is likely far more advanced than life on Earth. A recent…
New Study Pinpoints When Early Earth May Have Become Ready for Life’s Chemistry
[PSI] Conditions on the early Earth may have become stable enough to sustain the chemistry associated with the origins of life around 4.33 billion years…
Prebiotic Peptide Formation Triggered By Urea-rich Warm Little Ponds On Early Earth
[Bioorganic Chemistry]. In the study of the origin of life, the polymerization of amino acids into peptides in water faces significant thermodynamic barriers, often referred…