New Classroom Materials from the NAI: Exploring Deep Subsurface Life

Created by NAI’s IPTAI Team, the Exploring Deep Subsurface Life Workbook and DVD teaching materials highlight research sites at Harmony Gold Mine in South Africa, and Lupin Gold Mine and High Lake Mine in Nunavut Territory, Canada. The workbook¹s imagery invites the audience into the mine sites, and the lessons correspond to the astrobiology research carried out in the deep subsurface. The video and animation materials support and compliment the lessons in the workbook and introduce the scientists.

March 25, 2008 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice

Methane in the Martian Atmosphere

Scientists from NAI’s IPTAI Team have a paper out in Geophysical Research Letters detailing a new mechanism for recent methane release on Mars. Their results show that increasing salinity can cause destabilization of subsurface methane hydrates, and that active thermal or pressure fluctuations are not required to account for the presence of methane in the atmosphere.

Source: [Link]

June 18, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe

NAI’s Tullis Onstott makes “Time 100�

Astrobiologist Tullis Onstott has made this year’s “Time 100,� an annual list of “the 100 men and women whose power, talent or moral example is transforming the world,� according to list-maker Time magazine.

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May 3, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Earth’s Hidden Biospheres

Two recent discoveries in astrobiology challenge many of our assumptions about an integrated biological community on Earth. At the microbial level, it seems that there may be previously hidden biospheres that exist on Earth alongside our more familiar neighbors. One such community has been found deeply buried underground, while the other lives in the sea alongside more familiar life forms.

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November 6, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Microbes of the Deep

In this week’s Science, researchers from NAI’s Indiana, Princeton, Tennessee Astrobiology Initiative (IPTAI) and Carnegie Institution of Washington Teams report that they have found an extant microbial biome at 2.8km depth in a South African mine. Analyses showed thermophilic sulfate reducers existing “with no apparent reliance on photosynthetically derived substrates.”

Source: [Link]

October 20, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Abiogenic Explanation for Methane on Mars

Researchers from NAI’s Indiana Princeton Tennessee Astrobiology Initiative Team published their theory on the origin of the detected atmospheric methane on Mars in the current issue of Astrobiology. Measurements of deep fracture water samples from South Africa led to a model which distinguishes between abiogenic and microbial methane sources based upon their isotopic composition, and couples microbial methane production to molecular hydrogen generation by water radiolysis. The authors also propose an instrument for future missions to Mars which, with measurements over time, could distinguish mechanisms for methane emissions.

Source: [Link]

May 31, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe