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Material Cycling Across Earth’s Spheres And Triggers Of Cambrian Explosion: A Tectonic Perspective
[ELSP] A comprehensive model of the Cambrian explosion featuring “multi-factors coupling and multi-sphere driving”. Supercontinent breakup and mantle plume activity served as the initial trigger of environmental change in the Neoproterozoic, the orogenic belts and subduction zones under the modern plate tectonic regime during Gondwanan assembly served as the long-term sustained driving force, and the…
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Where Does Earth’s Nitrogen Go? Two Atoms Offer A Clue
[Science] Nitrogen is one of life’s building blocks, but it’s only helpful in the right…
Exotic Methanol Discovered In Planet-Building Zones
[NRAO] An international team of astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), of which…
More Than One Thousand TESS Planets
[NASA Exoplanet Archive] This week’s 70 new planets have unlocked a new exoplanet milestone: 1,000…
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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Astronomy & Telescopes
Atmospheres, Climate, Weather
Mars’ Oddest Cloud May Be Even Odder Than We Thought
[ESA]. Scientists using the European Space Agency’s Mars Express, in combination with a state-of-the-art meteorological model of the Red Planet, have found that there may be some very exotic physics behind Mars’s most curious cloud. Every spring and summer in Mars’s southern hemisphere, during the martian dusty season, we see a spectacular cloud emerge: the…
Read moreExploration Gear & Tech
Tricorder Tech: An Electrical Technique For Identifying Signs Of Life In Space
[The University of Osaka] The truth is out there – but identifying signs of life in space involves an intense search for biosignatures within our…
NASA Scientists Search For Clues About Mars’ Past In Scotland
[NASA] This summer, NASA scientists headed to the Scottish Highlands to follow up on last year’s announcement of potential biosignatures on Mars and prepare for…
Offworld Expedition Training: Astronauts Explore An Ancient Earth Volcano
[ESA]. From its rim, remnants of recent eruptions lie open for this crew of astronauts learning geology for planetary exploration. Participants of PANGAEA’s 10th edition…
Imaging & Spectroscopy
A Technosignature Survey Of The Anti-Solar Point: The SETI Institute’s Largest-Ever Campaign With The Allen Telescope Array
[astro-ph.IM] The ATA-ASP campaign is a radio technosignature survey of the Anti-Solar Point as a “Schelling point”, using the Allen Telescope Array (ATA) in the…
Complex Organic Molecules in Protostars with ALMA Spectral Surveys (COMPASS) II. Approach To Data Reduction And Products For Line-rich Broadband (sub)millimeter Spectra
[astro-ph.SR] Studying the chemical composition of the warm gas surrounding embedded solar-type protostars is one of the areas for which the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array…
Mapping Of Interstellar Ices With JWST In Protostellar Envelopes: Spatial Variations Of 13CO2, 12CO2, CO, OCN− and H2O ice
[astro-ph.SR] The composition of planets and their atmospheres is largely determined by the formation environment of the planet. This environment is pre-determined during early stages…
Biosignatures & Paleobiology
European Rover Trains For Mars In The Desert
[ESA] The exercise was an important rehearsal for what the ExoMars Rosalind Franklin rover might encounter when it lands on the Red Planet in 2030.…
Protocells Reproduce Morphological And Chemical Signatures Of Early Microfossils
[biorxiv.org] Identification of early microfossils relies on morphological and chemical criteria assumed to be unique to life, but whether abiotic microstructures can satisfy these criteria…
Molecular Complexity As A Signature Of Life
[PNAS Nexus] The presence of an abundance of complex molecules has been proposed as a universal signature of life. Molecular complexity is often measured by…