"Does all life on Earth share a common single-celled ancestor? If so, what is it called? "
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Daniel Glavin Wins 2010 Nier Prize
Daniel Glavin, winner of the 2010 Nier Prize. Photo Credit: Chris Gunn
Daniel Glavin has been selected by the international Meteoritical Society as the recipient of the 2010 Nier Prize. The prestigious Nier Prize is awarded to young scientists performing valuable research in fields related to meteoritics and planetary science.
Dr. Glavin was presented with the prize for his work on extraterrestrial organic chemistry. By examining carbonaceous meteorites, Glavin and his team have made important contributions toward understanding why life uses only left-handed versions of amino acids. It turns out that molecules delivered to Earth in meteorites may have played a role in life’s eventual bias toward...Source: [NASA GSFC]
November 18, 2009 / Posted by: Aaron Gronstal
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Vatican Hosts Study Week on Astrobiology
This past week in Rome as part of the International Year of Astronomy, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences hosted a Study Week on Astrobiology, an interdisciplinary event during which “cloistered astrobiologists confronted each other’s fields of research” and dialogued about the connections. The participants included many from the extended astrobiology community, including John Baross, David Charbonneau, Roger Summons, Andy Knoll, Chris Impey, Jonathan Lunine, Jill Tarter, Sara Seager, and Giovanna Tinetti.
“The questions of life’s origins and of whether life exists elsewhere in the universe are very suitable and deserve serious consideration,” said the Rev. Jose Gabriel Funes, an...
November 17, 2009 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice
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Ethics of Space Exploration
Last week, the Santa Clara University Markkula Center for Applied Ethics hosted a panel to discuss Challenges Raised by Life in Space. Today on KQED’s radio show The Forum, host Michael Krasney interviews some of those panelists for a national audience. They discuss a range of topics from the value and moral standing of the diversity of potential life elsewhere in the universe, to the modification of extraterrestrial ecosystems to suit human needs, to possible forward contamination of other planets through exploration.
November 12, 2009 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice
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Success in Monterey Bay Canyon
Image Credit: Alberto Behar
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientists in the Planetary Protection group, led by Dr. Kasthuri Venkateswaran, teamed up with microbiologists and geochemists from Harvard University in the laboratories of Dr. Colleen Cavanaugh and Dr. Peter Girguis to deploy the NASA Hydrothermal Vent Biosampler (HVB) on the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Vessel Pt. Lobos using the remotely operated vehicle Ventana.The NASA HVB is able to collect large-volume samples of hydrothermal vent fluid. It can operate in extreme temperatures reaching 400°C and at depths of up to 6,500 meters. The HVB allows astrobiologists to...
Source: [Link]
November 10, 2009 / Posted by: Aaron Gronstal
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Spotting Spores
Adrian Ponce, deputy manager for JPL’s planetary science section, has devised a new microscope-based method to quickly validate — from days to minutes — a spacecraft’s cleanliness. The method will help in decontaminating spacecraft before launch, and could have medical and pharmaceutical uses on Earth.
Source: [JPL]
October 27, 2009 / Posted by: Aaron Gronstal
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Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Sees Ice Exposed by Meteor Impact
NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has revealed frozen water hiding just below the surface of mid-latitude Mars. The spacecraft’s observations were obtained from orbit after meteorites excavated fresh craters on the Red Planet.
Scientists controlling instruments on the orbiter found bright ice exposed at five Martian sites with new craters that range in depth from approximately half a meter to 2.5 meters (1.5 feet to 8 feet). The craters did not exist in earlier images of the same sites. Some of the craters show a thin layer of bright ice atop darker underlying material. The bright patches darkened...
Source: [NASA Press Release]
September 24, 2009 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice
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Space Hand-Me-Downs
Much of the biology on Earth involves molecules that are oriented in a left-handed direction. A proposed nano-satellite would carry up some of these bio-molecules to see if something in space might be responsible for this left-handed excess. The project is part of the Astrobiology Science and Technology Instrument Development and Mission Concept Studies.
Source: [astrobio.net]
September 17, 2009 / Written by: Michael Schirber
