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Astrobiologists Study Microbial Life in Canadian Lake
This week a multinational and multidisciplinary team of researchers begin 2008 field operations in British Columbia for the Pavilion Lake Research Project. The Astrobiology Science and Technology for Exploring Planets program is one of several contributors to the project.
The Pavilion Lake research team is studying limestone structures called microbialites, located on the floor of the lake. These microbialites are believed to have...
June 23, 2008 / Written by: Linda Billings
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Can A Robot Draw A Map?
On a dry lakebed in the Mojave desert, a small experimental rover named Zoe wanders back and forth between dusty clay sediments and black fields of basaltic lava, belched out during eruptions that formed the nearby cinder cone, Amboy Crater.
March 6, 2008 / Written by: Henry Bortman
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New Astrobiology Roadmap Due in '08
A team of NASA and external representatives of the science community is in the process of updating NASA’s 2003 astrobiology roadmap. A draft revised roadmap, to be finalized later in 2008, is publicly available for review and comment online here.
The last iteration of the roadmap was issued in September 2003. The fundamental questions framing the roadmap – How does life begin and evolve? Does life exist elsewhere in the universe? What is the future of life on Earth...
February 13, 2008 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Astrobiology Prospects ROSE-y
The Astrobiology Program has a bigger budget in fiscal year (FY) 2008 (which began October 1, 2007) than it did for FY 2007, thanks to NASA Associate Administrator for Science Alan Stern and Planetary Sciences Division Director Jim Green. In one of his first actions at NASA, Stern allocated $1 million of his discretionary funds to the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI) to provide for continuity of membership beyond calendar year 2008. In additional action, Green allocated...
February 13, 2008 / Written by: Linda Billings
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ENDURANCE Project Taking Icy Test Dive
Underwater Robot Takes Test Dive in Wisconsin before Mission to Antarctica: ENDURANCE Project Demonstrating Concepts for Europa Exploration
February 8, 2008 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Mars Science Laboratory Shakedown in the High Arctic
Members of the AMASE team (AMASE stands for Arctic Mars Analog Svalbard Expedition) last month completed their fourth field season on the Arctic island of Spitsbergen. They went to test out instruments similar to those that will fly on an upcoming mission to Mars, and to perform a field test of a prototype rover, Cliff-bot, that is capable of climbing up and down 80-degree slopes.
Spitsbergen is the largest island in the Norwegian Svalbard archipelago, which lies between...
February 1, 2008 / Posted by: Yael Kovo
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How Low Can Geologists Go?
Scientists have begun the final leg of a five-year, NASA-funded mission to reach the bottom of Cenote Zacatón in Mexico, the world’s deepest known sinkhole.
No one has ever reached bottom and at least one diver has died in the attempt. Scientists want to learn more about Cenote Zacatón’s physical dimensions, the geothermal vents that feed it and the forms of life that exist in its murky depths.
Previous expeditions tested the robotic probe that...
November 13, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe
