[ESA] New evidence from gas seeping above volcanic rifts suggests Mars is not geologically dead deep inside, but merely sleeping.
hydrothermal
![Global map of Enceladus with color and contours indicating the estimated heat flux (in mWm−2 ) calculated from maps of shell thickness [Hemingway and Mittal, 2019]. Our results (Table 1) are plotted as lines using the same color scale as the background. Green labeled boxes show other estimates [Giese et al., 2008; Bland et al., 2012, 2007; Leonard et al., 2021] of paleo-heat fluxes using similar methods.-- [astro-ph.EP]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Paleoheat.png?resize=1200%2C721&ssl=1)
Posted inEnceladus
Paleo-heat Flux Estimates Across Enceladus Derived From Flexural Response Of The Ice Shell
[astro-ph.EP] Saturn’s moon Enceladus has active plumes suggestive of locally high heat fluxes at present, and the present-day heating is reasonably well characterized. However, the moon’s thermal history is not […]
Posted inImpact events
Impact Crater Hydrothermal Systems Support Rapid Microbial Enrichment and Diverse Metabolic Potential
[Geobiology ] Impact crater hydrothermal systems, formed after asteroid and comet impacts, have been proposed as promising habitats for life on early Earth and as key targets in the search […]
![A heterotrophic ecosystem enabled by fermentation on Enceladus. [astro-ph.EP]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Fermentation.png?resize=1200%2C720&ssl=1)
Posted inEnceladus
Fermentation Heterotrophy Can Reproduce Enceladus’s H2 And CH4 Under Limited Serpentinization
[astro-ph.EP] Saturn’s icy moon Enceladus is a prime target in the search for life beyond Earth. Abundant H2 and CH4 in Enceladus’s south-polar plume have been shown to be consistent […]
Posted inFossils & Paleontology
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 has not been rigorously tested.
Posted inExtremeophiles and Extreme Environments
Hot Spring Organism Breaks Record For Heat Tolerance Of Complex Life
[Cell Press] A tiny, single-celled organism can thrive at temperatures that would kill all other known complex life.
Posted inOrigin & Evolution of Life
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 ago, according to new research […]
![Distribution and protein structures of ancestral energy conservation enzymes in bacteria and archaea. For escape as free-living cells, metabolism had to achieve the state of a balanced stoichiometric reaction145, called redox balance in physiology, and the exergonic reactions of electron transfer from H2 to CO2 needed to be coupled to the pumping of ions from the inside of the cell to the outside (chemiosmotic coupling), as in modern cells. Prior to the coupling of CO2 reduction to ion pumping, the natural pH gradient provided by serpentinizing systems (pH 9–11, vs. sea water (pH 6.5146) was harnessable with the help of simple, abiotically synthesized hydrophobics147,148 such as fatty acids, which were recently shown to support the ATP-synthesizing function of a rotor-stator ATPase149. -- [q-bio.PE]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/Intermediate.png?resize=1200%2C721&ssl=1)
Posted inOrigin & Evolution of Life
Intermediate Stages In The Origin Of Metabolism At A Phosphorylating Hydrothermal Vent
[q-bio.PE] The origin of life required the emergence of metabolism, an autocatalytic network of enzymatic reactions that synthesize amino acids, nucleotides and cofactors. At the origin of metabolism there were […]
Posted inExtremeophiles and Extreme Environments
Small-Scale Mineral And Microbial Heterogeneities Near A Fumarole At The Furnas Hydrothermal Zone On The Azores
[Life (Basel)]. The Azores are characterized by intense volcanic activity, creating unique environments such as fumarole sites, where geothermal gases and high temperatures drive distinct chemical and biological processes.
Posted inUncategorized
Hydrothermal Origin Of Metabolic Phosphorylation
Phosphate is central to modern bioenergetics and to all theories for the origin of life. How phosphate entered metabolism is unknown, though microbial physiology and geochemical environments can provide important […]