Looking for Earths in All the Right Places

The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) is the data archive center for NASA’s Kepler mission, and has now received the first raw science data from Kepler. Now, the data can be analyzed and used to search for Earth-like worlds around distant stars.

Source: [astrobio.net]

July 3, 2009 / Posted by: Aaron Gronstal

Cooking Up Creation in a Computer

Bruce Damer has created 3-D computer simulations for NASA Ames, and he now hopes to use that experience to simulate the origin of life. The Evogrid is a proposed computerized version of the primordial soup on early Earth. Digitally simulating virtual particles could help answer the question of how life originated on Earth, and perhaps even spread life to other worlds.

Source: [astrobio.net]

July 2, 2009 / Written by: Leslie Mullen

MAVEN

In September, NASA awarded the University of Colorado the biggest research grant in the school’s history for a project led by NAI Emeritus PI Bruce Jakosky to investigate the history of the climate on Mars. The idea behind the $486 million project—known as Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution mission, or MAVEN to try to discover why Mars’ climate has changed over the past few billions years, and whether the planet before those changes was an environment suitable for life…

July 1, 2009 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice

Astrobiology, To the Best of Our Knowledge

Today on WAMC’s radio program To The Best Of Our Knowledge, NAI Principal Investigator Doug Whittet talks about astrobiology, and the ongoing research and education activities of his New York Center for Astrobiology (NYCA), seated at RPI. This interview sets up future programs featuring staff scientists and guest lecturers at the NYCA.

June 29, 2009 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice

Funding in Evolutionary Processes

The National Science Foundation (NSF) Division of Environmental Biology has released a solicitation for opportunities in the study of Evolutionary Processes. The aim is support research on microevolutionary processes and their macroevolutionary consequences. A wide range of topics are of interest, including mutation, gene flow, natural selection and genetic drift. Understanding how genetically-based changes in organisms affect long-term evolution is of great importance to astrobiology.

For further information and submission guidelines, visit the NSF at: http://www.nsf.gov/funding/pgm_summ.jsp?pims_id=503421&govDel=USNSF_25

Source: [NSF]

June 29, 2009 / Posted by: Aaron Gronstal

Spirit Stuck but Still Sleuthing

NASA’s Mars rover Spirit is having traction trouble in the martian soil. Although stuck, the rover is taking advantage of the situation by learning more about Mars’ environmental history.

Source: [astrobio.net]

Salt Discovered in Saturn's Outermost Ring

For the first time, scientists working on NASA’s Cassini mission have detected sodium salts in ice grains of Saturn’s outermost ring. Detecting salty ice indicates that Saturn’s moon Enceladus, which primarily replenishes the ring with material from discharging jets, could harbor a reservoir of liquid water — perhaps an ocean — beneath its surface.

Cassini discovered the water-ice jets in 2005 on Enceladus. These jets expel tiny ice grains and vapor, some of which escape the moon’s gravity and form Saturn’s outermost ring. Cassini’s cosmic dust analyzer has examined the composition of those grains and found salt within...

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Source: [NASA Press Release]

June 24, 2009 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice