[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 are ESA astronaut Pablo Álvarez Fernández, […]
Away Teams & Field Reports
Posted inExploration Gear & Tech
Looking Inside Living Antarctic Cells For The First Time
[British Antarctic Survey] Cambridge engineers have built the first microscope to see inside living cells in sub-zero conditions, revealing secrets of Antarctic fish survival.
Posted inMicrobiology & Virology
Dispersal Pathways And Infection Strategies Within The Global Halophilic Virome
[ISME Communications] Microbial biogeography has recently attracted significant attention for its potential to provide novel ecological and evolutionary insights, with environmental connectivity emerging as a key factor in the global […]
Posted inTricorders & Sensors
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 that would freeze most bacteria […]
Posted inWater/Hycean Worlds & Oceanography
Water Planet Recon: How Accurately Can We Measure Earth Ocean’s Deepest Point?
[Research Organization of Information and Systems]. How deep is the deepest ocean—and how precisely can we actually measure it? Bathymetric maps obtained by each sounding at various survey speeds and […]
Posted inAway Teams & Field Reports
Ice Planet Exploration: Tara Polaris I Expedition
[ESA] Soon to be frozen in space and time, this alien-looking vessel is beginning its first mission into drifting ice in the Arctic Ocean. A dozen people won’t leave it […]
![KDE-based mass probability map for the latest solution (0.8 h before impact) of 2023 CX1, corresponding to the smallest positional uncertainty. Colors represent the spatial mass probability density, contours denote the highest posterior density regions, and crosses mark recovered meteorites (size and color proportional to mass). -- [astro-ph.EP]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Sample-Return-Tech.png?resize=1200%2C716&ssl=1)
Posted inMeteorites & Asteroids
Sample Return Tech: Pre-impact Meteorite Strewn Field Predictions For Imminent Impactors And Meteorite Recovery
[astro-ph.EP] The flux of meteoroids reaching the Earth is continuous, ranging from microscopic grains to occasional metre and decametre scale bodies. The smallest ones fully ablate in the upper atmosphere, […]
Posted inExtremeophiles and Extreme Environments
Microbial Evolution, Biogeochemical Functions, And Environmental Adaptations In A Desert Saline Lake On The Qinghai–Tibet Plateau
[biorxiv.org] The Eboliang Hu saline lakes in the hyper-arid Qaidam Basin is a high-altitude, weakly acidic hypersaline system with strong environmental gradients and limited nitrogen availability.
Posted inBiosignatures & Paleobiology
Compositional Heterogeneity Structures Microbial Microhabitats across Distinct Mineral Substrates
[biorxiv.org] Microbial communities living on and in rocks operate at the microscale, where interactions with minerals fundamentally shape community structure and function. Yet the relationship between micron scale mineralogical configurations […]
Posted inBiosignatures & Paleobiology
Determining The “Biosignature Threshold” For Life Detection On Biotic, Abiotic, or Prebiotic Worlds.
[Astrobiology (Journal) via PubMed] The field of prebiotic chemistry has demonstrated that complex organic chemical systems that exhibit various life-like properties can be produced abiotically in the laboratory.