Seeking Signs of Life at the Glacier's Edge
Microbes living at the edges of Arctic ice sheets could help researchers pinpoint evidence for similar microorganisms that could have evolved on Mars, the Jovian moon Europa, or Saturn's moon Enceladus.
Research... at a Glance
Impacts Could be Boon for Subterranean Life
A drilling project into the Chesapeake Bay impact structure has found evidence that the subsurface may become more habitable after a large impact
How Deep Must Life Hide to Be Safe on Europa?
Jupiter's icy moon Europa is subject to constant and significant blasts of radiation. Researchers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory are now attempting to determine how deep life must lay beneath the moon's crust in order to survive.
Raindrops in Rock
A new study published in Nature from NASA's Exobiology and Evoluationary Biology program investigators and their colleagues looks at fossilized raindrops and what they indicate about conditions on the early Earth.
Organics Probably Formed Easily in Early Solar System
Complex organic compounds, including many important to life on Earth, were readily produced under conditions that likely prevailed in the primordial solar system.
Is it Snowing Microbes on Enceladus? March 27, 2012: There's a tiny moon orbiting beyond Saturn's rings that's full of promise, and maybe -- just maybe -- microbes.
Follow the Uranium
Researchers funded by NASA's Astrobiology Institute and Exobiology Program have developed a novel geochemical tool that compares the partitioning of uranium isotopes from seawater into carbonates.
Amino Acid Alphabet Soup
For more than 3 billion years, organisms on Earth have relied on a standard set of 20 amino acids to build the proteins that carry out life's essential actions. But did it have to be this way?