Astrobiology Science and Technology for Exploring Planets (ASTEP)

NAI Launches FAR Seminar Series on October 6th

September 19, 2008 / Written by: Estelle Dodson

NAI is excited to announce the launch of the “Forum for Astrobiology Research” (FAR), a virtual seminar series given by graduate students, postdocs and early-career astrobiologists that will be broadcast to the entire astrobiology community.

The first seminar will be held on Monday, October 6th at 11:00am PDT (12:00pm MDT, 1:00pm CDT and 2:00pm EDT). The topic is prebiotic chemistry and the presenters are Catherine Neish of the University of Arizona and William Brazelton of the University of Washington. Stay tuned for titles, abstracts and connection details. For those of you familiar with the NAI Director’s Seminars, the FAR Seminars will follow the same connection protocols.

Topics and dates for the Academic 2008/2009 year are:

October 6 – Prebiotic Chemistry
November 3 – Extreme Life
December 1 – Origin of Life
January 12 – Habitability
February 9 – Habitability
March 9 – Exoplanets
April 13 – Impact of Life on Its Environment
May 11 – Analogue Research and Instrumentation
June 1 – The Search for Life

Special thanks to the FAR Science Organizing Committee for their help in planning the series: Abigail Allwood, Marina António, Leigh Arino de la Rubia, Mark Claire, Julia DeMarines, Aaron D Goldman, Nader Haghighipour, Avi Mandell, Matthew Pasek, Sean Raymond, Matthew Schrenk, Evgenya Shkolnik, Melissa Trainer, Shannon Tronick and Katherine Wright.

Please email Estelle Dodson with questions, comments or suggestions.

Early Earth Primed for Later RNA and DNA Production

September 19, 2008 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice

Researchers from NAI’s University of Arizona team and their colleagues at the University of Leeds have a new paper in Angewandte Chemie International Edition dealing with prebiotic chemistry and the early Earth. Work both experimentally and with models of the early atmosphere, the team shows that the Hadean and early Archaean Earth was primed with an abundance of condensed phosphates, enabling the formation of the necessary precursors of RNA and DNA. This research removes one of the large stumbling blocks in prebiotic chemistry- that the early Earth lacked a low-temperature reservoir of activated phosphate compounds capable of eventually leading to the origin of life.

Molecules in the Atmospheres of Extrasolar Planets - A Workshop in Paris

When November 19, 2008 (Wed) ~ November 21, 2008 (Fri)

Where Salle Cassini, Observatoire Paris, Paris, France

September 19, 2008 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice

Exoplanets are being discovered at an ever accelerating pace, and planetary scientists and astronomers are increasingly called upon to make the transition from discovery to characterization. This workshop aims at bringing together different scientific communities: solar system planetary scientists, brown dwarf and exoplanet modellers and observers, molecular spectroscopy and instrument development experts. We will cover different topics: radiative transfer, line lists, photochemical models, dynamics, and observations using space- and ground-based facilities. Current results will be discussed in the context of the preparation of upcoming missions, SPITZER, JWST, and SPICA, and the next generation of direct detection mission concepts from ground and space.

Cyanobacterial Biomarkers in Ancient Rocks

September 19, 2008 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice

Members of NAI’s Penn State, Carnegie Institution, and MIT teams report in a recent issue of Earth and Planetary Science Letters, the distribution of biomarkers in 2.72–2.56 billion-year-old, Neoarchean rocks from the Hamersley Province on the Pilbara Craton in Western Australia. Their observations are consistent with a cyanobacterial source for 2-methylhopanes, in which cyanobacteria were likely the cornerstone of microbial communities in shallow-water ecosystems providing molecular oxygen, fixed carbon, and possibly fixed nitrogen.

Their data, revealing relative abundances of 3-methylhopanes, but not 2-methylhopanes, strongly correlate to stable carbon isotopic composition of insoluble particulate organic matter (kerogen). The unanticipated nature of this relationship provides evidence for a shallow-water locus of carbon cycling through aerobic oxidation of methane and, coincidentally, a means to demonstrate biomarker syngenicity.

Evolution of the Gut

September 19, 2008 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice

Researchers from NAI’s University of Hawai’i team have a paper in this week’s Nature about the evolution of the animal gut. For more than 100 years zoologists have speculated about scenarios of how the bilaterally symmetrical animals (animals that have a left and a right side, like flies, fish, and humans) evolved from a simple circular (radially symmetric) ancestor that looked similar to jelly fish or corals. In the commonly presented scenarios this transition is connected to the evolution of a through-gut with an anterior mouth and posterior anus. It has been thought that both openings emerged simultaneously from a single embryological opening through which the inner tissues enter (called blastopore).

Recent molecular phylogenies however, place the marine acoel flatworms at the base of the bilaterally symmetric animals. Acoels are thus survivors from the Pre-Cambrian era that retain many ancestral characters (e.g. a nervous system composed of multiple nerve cords and only one opening to their digestive system). One can see Acoels as an evolutionary stepping stone that offers clues about the sequence of character evolution of bilateral animals.

To find out how the acoel digestive system, with its single opening (“mouth”), is related to the through gut present in some bilaterians like humans and flies, the researchers looked at the expression patterns of genes that play a role in the formation of both the mouth and the anus in bilaterian animals.

They were able to show that the sac-like gut of the bilaterian ancestor possessed a single opening that was inherited as the mouth in such diverse animals like flies and sea stars. Furthermore, the team accumulated evidence from gene expression patterns that the anal orifice evolved independently in different animal lineages, possibly in association with the gonoduct (the duct through which eggs and sperm are released). The independent evolution of the anus can be explained by the increase in body size and an elongation of the body. Increased energetic needs and a long blind gut would have made sorting food and waste through a single opening inefficient.

Their work, in conjunction with a better understanding of the evolutionary relationships of animals, clearly rejects previous ideas found in every zoology text book about the evolution of the last common ancestor of flies and humans from a radial symmetric animal (e.g. the Gastraea-Hypothesis of Ernst Haeckel). The team states that this ancestor that lived over 550 myr ago, before the radiation of the bilateral animals was far less complex morphologically than previously thought. At this time our ancestors were hermaphroditic worms, that had only a mouth and no anus. We literally had to spit out our undigested food. Our ancestor was likely a very small, soft-bodied animal that lived between the sand grains in the ocean, similar to the life-style of most acoel species. This also explains why no fossils have yet been found of these animals. The team is certain that their ongoing studies of the nervous system of these worms will yield to similar important insights into the evolutionary roots of the human brain and spinal cord.

Jill Tarter and Will Wright Talk Gaming, Education, and Evolution in Seed Magazine's Video 'Salon'

September 16, 2008 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice

While developing his new game SPORE, Will Wright indulged in his lifelong interest in astrobiology and drew from the work of Jill Tarter over numerous visits to the SETI Institute. In this video, Wright and Tarter meet to ask each other questions about gaming and science, the value of scientific revolutions, and advanced life in the universe.

NASA Chooses MAVEN as the Next Mars Scout Mission

September 15, 2008 / Written by: NASA Press Release

NASA has selected a Mars robotic mission that will provide information about the Red Planet’s atmosphere, climate history and potential habitability in greater detail than ever before.

Called the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft, the $485 million mission is scheduled for launch in late 2013. The selection was evaluated to have the best science value and lowest implementation risk from 20 mission investigation proposals submitted in response to a NASA Announcement of Opportunity in August 2006.

“This mission will provide the first direct measurements ever taken to address key scientific questions about Mars’ evolution,” said Doug McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

Mars once had a denser atmosphere that supported the presence of liquid water on the surface. As part of a dramatic climate change, most of the Martian atmosphere was lost. MAVEN will make definitive scientific measurements of present-day atmospheric loss that will offer clues about the planet’s history.

“The loss of Mars’ atmosphere has been an ongoing mystery,” McCuistion said. “MAVEN will help us solve it.”

The principal investigator for the mission is Bruce Jakosky of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado at Boulder. The university will receive $6 million to fund mission planning and technology development during the next year. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., will manage the project. Lockheed Martin of Littleton, Colo., will build the spacecraft based on designs from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and 2001 Mars Odyssey missions. The team will begin mission design and implementation in the fall of 2009.

Launched in August 2005, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is a multipurpose spacecraft that carries the most powerful telescopic camera ever flown to another planet. The camera can show Martian landscape features as small as a kitchen table from low orbital altitudes. The mission is examining potential landing sites for future surface missions and providing a communications relay for other Mars spacecraft.

The 2001 Mars Odyssey, launched in April of that year, is determining the composition of the Red Planet’s surface by searching for water and shallow buried ice. The spacecraft also is studying the planet’s radiation environment.

After arriving at Mars in the fall of 2014, MAVEN will use its propulsion system to enter an elliptical orbit ranging 90 to 3,870 miles above the planet. The spacecraft’s eight science instruments will take measurements during a full Earth year, which is roughly equivalent to half of a Martian year. MAVEN also will dip to an altitude 80 miles above the planet to sample Mars’ entire upper atmosphere. During and after its primary science mission, the spacecraft may be used to provide communications relay support for
robotic missions on the Martian surface.

“MAVEN will obtain critical measurements that the National Academy of Science listed as being of high priority in their 2003 decadal survey on planetary exploration,” said Michael Meyer, the Mars chief scientist at NASA Headquarters. “This field of study also was highlighted in the 2005 NASA Roadmap for New Science of the Sun-Earth System Connection.”

The Mars Scout Program is designed to send a series of small, low-cost, principal investigator-led missions to the Red Planet. The Phoenix Mars Lander was the first spacecraft selected. Phoenix landed on the icy northern polar region of Mars on May 25, 2008. The spacecraft completed its prime science mission on Aug. 25, 2008. The mission has been extended through Sept. 30.

NASA’s Mars Exploration Program seeks to characterize and understand Mars as a dynamic system, including its present and past environment, climate cycles, geology and biological potential.

For more information about NASA’s exploration of Mars, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/mars

NASA's Carl Sagan Fellows to Study Extraterrestrial Worlds

September 8, 2008 / Written by: NASA Press Release

NASA announced Wednesday the new Carl Sagan Postdoctoral Fellowships in Exoplanet Exploration, created to inspire the next generation of explorers seeking to learn more about planets, and possibly life, around other stars.

Planets beyond our solar system, called exoplanets, are being discovered at a staggering pace, with more than 300 currently known. Decades ago, long before any exoplanets had been found, the late Carl Sagan imagined such worlds, and pioneered the scientific pursuit of life that might exist on them. Sagan was an astronomer and a highly successful science communicator.

NASA’s new Sagan fellowships will allow talented young scientists to tread the path laid out by Sagan. The program will award stipends of approximately $60,000 per year, for a period of up to three years, to selected postdoctoral scientists. Topics can range from techniques for detecting the glow of a dim planet in the blinding glare of its host star, to searching for the crucial ingredients of life in other planetary systems.

“We are investing in our nation’s best and brightest in an emerging field that is tremendously inspiring to the public,” said Jon Morse, Astrophysics Division director at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

The Sagan Fellowship will join NASA’s new Einstein Postdoctoral Fellowship in Physics of the Cosmos and the Hubble Postdoctoral Fellowship in Cosmic Origins. All three fellowships represent a new theme-based approach, in which fellows will focus on compelling scientific questions, such as “are there Earth-like planets orbiting other stars?”

“NASA’s science-driven mission portfolio, its cultivation of young talent to pursue cutting-edge research, and the decision to commit its genius to a question of transcendent cultural significance, would have thrilled Carl,” said Ann Druyan, Sagan’s widow and collaborator, who continues to write and produce.

“That this knowledge will be pursued in his name, as he joins a triumvirate of the leading lights of 20th century astronomy, is a
source of infinite pride to our family,” said Druyan. “It signifies that Carl’s passion to engage us all in the scientific experience, his daring curiosity and urgent concern for life on this planet, no longer eclipse his scientific achievements.”

A call for Sagan Fellowship proposals went out to the scientific community earlier this week, with selections to be announced in February 2009.

“There is an explosion of interest in the field,” said Charles
Beichman of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. “Now we are going down a scientific path that Carl Sagan originally blazed, torch in hand, as he led us through the dark.” Beichman is executive director of NASA’s Exoplanet Science Institute at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, which will administer the fellowship program.

Recently, NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes have made landmark observations of hot, Jupiter-like planets orbiting other stars. The telescopes detected methane and water in the planets’ atmospheres — the same molecules that might serve as tracers of life if discovered around smaller, rocky planets in the future. In a 1994 paper for the journal Nature, Sagan and colleagues used these and
other molecules to identify life on a planet — Earth. They used NASA’s Galileo spacecraft to observe the molecular signatures of our “pale blue dot,” as Sagan dubbed Earth, while the spacecraft flew by.

“Only a select few scientists carry the insight, vision and
persistence to open entire new vistas on the cosmos,” said Neil deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist and Frederick P. Rose director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. “We know about Einstein. We know about Hubble. Add to this list Carl Sagan, who empowered us all — scientists as well as the public — to see planets not simply as cosmic objects but as worlds of their own that could harbor life.”

NASA’s Kepler mission, which Sagan championed in his last years, will launch next year and will survey hundreds of thousands of nearby stars for Earth-like worlds, some of which are likely to orbit within the star’s water-friendly “habitable zone” favorable for life as we know it.

More information about NASA’s Sagan Fellowships is available on the Web at:

http://nexsci.caltech.edu/sagan

Looking for Life on Mars in a Canadian Lake

September 8, 2008 / Written by: Henry Bortman

On the surface, Pavilion Lake, nestled among the peaks of Canada’s Marble Range, looks like a thousand other mountain lakes. It’s not unusually large or deep. It’s not especially acidic, or alkaline; it’s not overly salty; nor are there high concentrations of minerals dissolved in its water. Locals come here to fish, to boat, to swim, and to watch the summer clouds drift by.

But underwater lies an astonishing discovery that has drawn astrobiologists from around the world to this rural corner of British Columbia. Pavilion Lake is host to an underwater “forest” of microbialites, coral-like structures, in a variety of shapes and sizes, that may help guide the search for life on Mars.

“The size of these microbialites is unlike anything else that’s ever been documented,” said Darlene Lim of NASA Ames Research Center. Lim is the principal investigator for the Pavilion Lake Research Project (PLRP). “On a micro scale, there might be a lot of similarities to what you see in other lakes, other ponds, around the world, and also in marine environments. But on a macro scale, they look very different. And the fact that they’re in this very accessible, sort of regular, recreational lake is curious.”

Scientists have been studying the Pavilion Lake formations for nearly a decade. Scuba divers have retrieved samples from as deep as 100 feet below the surface for analysis. But the lake is too deep – more than 200 feet at some points – and the microbialites structures too varied for divers to survey it thoroughly. So this summer, a team of researchers went through a rigorous training program to become submarine pilots and then spent a week exploring the lake in DeepWorker submarines built by Nuytco Research of North Vancouver, British Columbia. Their goal was to map the distribution of microbialites in the lake, and to bring back a more-extensive set of samples, including samples from the deepest regions.

The streamlined, shiny black DeepWorkers – there were two of them – looked more like George Jetson’s flying car than a typical Hunt-for-Red-October-type submarine. There was just enough room for one person to fit inside and the pilot’s head stuck up into a Plexiglas bubble that hinged open for access. The unit was operated entirely by foot pedals.

At the start of each run, a custom-built barge, pushed by a small motorboat lashed to its back end, hauled the DeepWorkers into position. The pilots climbed inside, the hatches were sealed and the subs, assisted by a pair of divers, were lowered through a hole in the floor of the barge into the water.

The pilots then “flew” the subs along a course decided upon during lengthy scientific discussions earlier in the day. The runs typically lasted 2 to 3 hours. The pilots were guided by another pair of team members, who tracked the subs’ movements from CapComm, a rectangular flat-bottom watercraft with a metal roof decked out in Christmas lights. Although the pilots had excellent visibility, they literally didn’t know where they were going without continuous navigational updates from CapComm.

The microbialites, composed of calcium carbonate, range in size from small bumps just a few centimeters across to enormous structures as much as 12 feet high. They come in a variety of shapes; some have been described as looking like cauliflower, others like broccoli, still others like asparagus, or fingers. Some contain central columns that resemble chimneys.

But it’s not just their varied shapes that makes them so interesting. It’s the fact that no one knows how they formed.

“We are sure that the structures are here. We’re sure that they vary significantly with depth. And we’re sure that they’re not found in other analogous lakes. Those are the facts, the observational facts,” said Chris McKay of NASA Ames Research Center. McKay was one of the first scientists to scuba dive in Pavilion Lake. “When you look at structures like this, the standard hypothesis is that organisms are playing a role in creating them. But we haven’t proven that here.”

Present-day bacteria are playing some role in forming calcium carbonate structures in the lake, Lim said. “There’s trash down there. And the trash is fairly recent; at most it’s like 100 years old, but probably less than that. We know that there’s carbonate deposition happening on the trash. We know that there is microbial growth of some sort on the trash, there are microbial crusts that are developing on trash.”

Some cyanobacteria excrete calcium carbonate, so one possibility is that the crusts are composed of this bacterial waste. Or perhaps, the bacteria build up an electric charge along their cell walls, which attracts calcium carbonate in the lake water; or they secrete slime that the carbonates bind to.

But whether or not the process that is forming the modern-day carbonate crusts is the same process that formed the bulk of the large structures, “that’s what we’re trying to figure out,” Lim said.

The working hypothesis is that bacteria were involved in some way in creating the large structures. But it’s also possible that, although bacteria form crusts on the surfaces of the structures, the structures themselves were the product of a purely chemical, rather than a biological, process.

Cyanobacteria in other locations are famous for building a variety of structures, from thick rubbery mats to layered dome-like structures known as stromatolites, which are thought to have been the dominant form of life on early Earth. Today, though, they are rare, existing only in extreme environments.

The shallow waters of Shark’s Bay, in Western Australia, for example, are home to large fields of dome-shaped stromatolites. But Shark’s Bay is too salty for the tiny worms that like to snack on the bacteria. That’s why the stromatolites can thrive: there’s nothing around to eat them.

Pavilion Lake, however, is “normal.” It has all kinds of larger organisms living in it. It’s even stocked with fish. And therein lies the mystery. There are smaller, less diverse, carbonate structures in another nearby lake, Kelly Lake, but none have been found in any of the other lakes in the region. Something makes Pavilion Lake unique. It’s just that no one has figured out yet what that something is.

Researchers are approaching the problem from a number of different angles. Some are looking at the chemistry of the water and trying to understand the lake’s topography and underground water sources. Others are doing DNA analysis of the slime that coats the microbialites to learn what organisms are living there, and what they eat – and excrete.

Still others are comparing the carbon in calcium-carbonate samples from the slime layer to that in samples taken from the hard core of the structures, to determine whether there is a clear biological signature in the core. Living organisms prefer to use the lighter isotope of carbon, C-12, so they tend to leave the environment around them enriched in the heavier C-13.

Results on that front remain inconclusive, says Greg Slater of McMaster University in Ontario, Canada. Slater is a co-PI of PLRP. “The carbonate in the surface community has a signature of biological activity. But when you go in deeper and down into the structure, that signal doesn’t seem to be preserved.”

Which is odd, because if the structures were built by microorganisms, there should be some isotopic evidence of their biological origin. Slater plans to use powerful microscopes to compare the crystal structure of calcium carbonate from different depths within the microbialites. It’s possible that, over time, the structures have dissolved and recrystalized, in the process changing from one form of calcium carbonate to another – and losing their biological carbon-isotope signature in the process. If this avenue of research pans out, the results could provide new insight into how biosignatures are modified and preserved over time, and that understanding, in turn, could aid in future efforts to look for biosignatures on Mars.

Lim and her colleagues plan to return to Pavilion Lake in future years to continue their work – perhaps with an even more unusual submarine. Although the DeepWorkers enabled researchers to collect samples from the deepest parts of the lake, it’s difficult to maneuver them precisely enough to avoid damaging the microbialites. Lim is hopeful that a new combination-submarine-and-pressurized-underwater-suit, under development by Nuytco, will make it possible for divers to work in the deepest parts of the lake without having to resort to dangerous compression diving.

The Pavilion Lake Research Project 2008 field work was supported by the Canadian Space Agency, NASA, McMaster University, the University of British Columbia, British Columbia Parks, the Pavilion First Nations Band and Nuytco Research Ltd.

Source: [Astrobiology Magazine]

Mars Research in Polar Bear Country

September 3, 2008 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Interview with Hans Amundsen

Hans Amundsen is a Norwegian geologist and the expedition leader of AMASE (Arctic Mars Analog Svalbard Expedition). AMASE is an international, interdisciplinary scientific research project that since 2003 has traveled to Svalbard, a group of islands in the High Arctic that provides some of the best sites on Earth for doing Mars-related field research. Among the most valuable geologic discoveries there are carbonate globules similar to those found in the martian meteorite ALH84001. Many of the scientific instruments slated for future Mars rovers, NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) and ESA’s ExoMars, have been field-tested in Svalbard. Astrobiology Magazine’s field research editor Henry Bortman recently spoke with Amundsen about the history of AMASE.

Astrobiology Magazine (AM): How did you get involved in the AMASE project?

Hans Amundsen (HA): It dates back 11 years ago when Allan Treiman at LPI and Dave Blake and Ted Bunch at NASA Ames tracked down a paper I wrote in Nature on some carbonate globules in arctic volcanoes up on Svalbard.

At that time I was working for an oil company. One day while I was surfing on the Sojourner rover website, looking at these fantastic Mars images, I got an email from Allan Treiman, asking for samples from Svalbard and if I wanted to join in on the work they were doing on the Alan Hills meteorite (ALH84001, a meteorite from Mars that some scientists argued contained signs of martian life). That was ’97. After a few years of exchanging samples and emails, we started working on the idea of getting more scientists up to this locality to try to find out more about how carbonates form on Mars, and to use it as a Mars analogue in a general sense.

In 2003, with the help of the University of Oslo, I managed to charter a small ice-breaker to go up there with a crew and the whole works. The university took the risk of chartering it and I sold out the slots onboard to Mars science people, and the word just spread. Steelie (Andrew Steele of Carnegie Institution of Washington) called me up a couple weeks before the expedition was setting out and asked if there were any vacant slots and I had two, so he came along with his post-doc, Maia Schweizer.

People came in from all over the world. We met there for the first time, onboard ship, and just headed off. We had no funding, there was no project plan, it was just a lot of very, very enthusiastic people. Some of them are still onboard.

Steelie is the AMASE chief scientist and has become my brother-in-arms on this project. We’ve developed it together with a core team of people that came onboard during the first years. And it’s now grown so much, we had to hire a larger ship. So we have an icebreaker that we charter every year, the 900-ton R/V Lance, with room for 32 scientists. We’ve got funding from both NASA and ESA now: Steelie’s through his ASTEP project; and I got funding through ESA’s PRODEX program. The PRODEX project is designed to test ExoMars instruments, the same way we test MSL and other instruments for NASA. So now we actually have deliverables that we have to come up with; we can’t just play around any more.

AM: What makes Svalbard such a good research site?

HA: Within a fairly limited area you have access to all sorts of geology. It’s a fantastic classroom for any type of geology. And because it’s in the High Arctic, there’s no vegetation. There’s lots of fjords, so you have access to all the sites by ship. It’s comparable to Antarctica in terms of conditions and geology but it’s much cheaper to operate. I’ve been doing field work on Svalbard for the past 25 years, on and off, and I know the area very well and how to operate there. We’ve worked four or five different areas, some of them dealing with different aspects of the Alan Hills carbonate story. We’ve been looking at blueberry (hematite) concretion analogs, old stromatolites, red beds, fluvial sediments, different things that are relevant for Mars research and astrobiology in general.

AM: Where exactly is Svalbard?

HA: It’s directly north of Norway, 80 degrees north, way north of the Arctic Circle. It’s governed by the Svalbard Treaty, which was set down in 1920 and states that Svalbard is Norwegian territory, governed by Norway, but that anyone who has signed the Svalbard Treaty has access to its resources. So the Russians mine for coal there. There’s a Polish research station, and of course there’s a Norwegian research station and Longyearbyen with around 2,000 people. Actually, there’s lots of international research occurring on Svalbard.

AM: What has been the most interesting aspect for you of working on Svalbard?

HA: Gathering all these interdisciplinary scientists and putting them onboard a ship, which is a confined environment, and making them work together has been a fantastic experience. We have what we call the “polar bear factor,” which means that we have to take safety issues very seriously and focus on building teams.

Nobody’s allowed to work alone. You always work in groups of four or five people. There’s always radio communication going on. We have to know where everybody is, we have to look out for bears, and make sure that people are not dehydrated, cold, or wet.

That enables you to take all these alpha personalities and weld them into a team; they have to collaborate. People have to carry each other’s gear; they have to watch each other’s back. We always have one scientist standing guard with a rifle watching while other scientists do their work. That makes it a fantastic environment for forcing people to work together, and it actually fosters interdisciplinary science. People who normally wouldn’t even talk, they have to collaborate. It’s turned the AMASE culture into something kind of special.

AM: Is it a stressful environment?

HA: No, but because of the midnight sun, it’s daylight all the time, you can work 24/7. People tend to work, not sleep. And when they’re finished with whatever they have to do, they’ll just stand on deck and look at that fantastic scenery. So during the two weeks these things last, maybe you average 4 or 5 hours of sleep a night. You’re exhausted by the end. There’s a lot of physical activity, a lot of walking involved, and no trails. And you have to carry stuff. We do have helicopters for when we need to lift something heavy, but there’s a lot of hiking. We’re hiking up steep mountainsides and walking on glaciers and carrying heavy equipment, and working very, very long hours.

AM: What’s the focus of your research going to be this year?

HA: From the previous year, we’ve got ESA instruments onboard, ExoMars instruments. In the past we focused on microbiology and mineralogy tools. This year we’re testing the PanCam imager, the Infrared spectrometer MIMA (Mars Inrared MApper) and also the ground-penetrating Radar, called WISDOM (Water Ice and Subsurface Deposit Observations on Mars). The Raman/LIBS instrument will be along for the second time.

There are two field sites this year that we haven’t visited before. One is a continuous section of sediments that covers about 350 million years of Earth history, going from the Carboniferous (which began about 360 million years ago) until the Tertiary. The entire section has been rotated sideways so the beds are oriented vertically and you can actually walk 2 or 3 kilometers through 350 million years along a beach cliff, and you can address all sorts of geochemistry, mineralogy, microbiology, and biosignature questions.

And then there’s a small ice cap far north on Svalbard, which is dissected. So you have this 5 to 10 meter wall with beautiful structures — small sedimentary horizons in the ice — and we’ll hit that with all sorts of instruments. That’s a new science scene to us, looking at ice in that way.

AM: You’ve mentioned polar bears a couple of times. How often do you see a bear?

HA: Last year we had a couple of bear incidents. One day when we were working up a hillside on a volcano, suddenly a bear wandered by, down by the beach. Nothing dangerous, but we just sort of monitored it while it walked along for a couple of hours. We just stopped working and made sure that the bear didn’t approach us, and it went off. And another incident, we were going ashore somewhere and we more or less stepped onto a bear, but it ran off. So, yeah, they’re there. And they have no natural enemies. They eat what they want to eat. They can run 100 yards in 6 seconds. So we run everybody through an Arctic safety course, arranged by the university on Svalbard, which involves dos and don’ts, and polar bear psychology, and shooting practice with rifles. Everybody’s supposed to be able to handle a rifle and know what to do when a polar bear gets too close.

Source: [Astrobiology Magazine]