Spectra of Two Extrasolar Planets

Researchers from NAI’s Carnegie Institution of Washington and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Teams have a new paper in Nature describing the infrared spectrum of exoplanet HD 209458b as obtained by the NASA Spitzer Space Telescope. Scientists from NAI’s University of Arizona and Alumni Virtual Planetary Laboratory Teams are contributing authors on a similar paper in Astrophysical Journal Letters which details the spectrum of exoplanet HD 189733b. Both sets of results show relatively flat spectra, with no significant absorption by water or methane, in contrast with the predictions of most atmospheric models. One spectral feature of...

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February 26, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Stardust Sample Analysis

A special issue of Science (Dec 15) includes several papers reporting on various aspects of Stardust sample analysis including an organics survey, isotopic and elemental compositions, mineralogy and petrology, and infrared spectroscopy. Many NAI researchers contributed to this comprehensive analytical campaign, including members of NAI’s Teams at the Carnegie Institution of Washington, NASA’s Ames Research Center and Goddard Space Flight Center, and NAI’s Alumni Team at the University of Washington.

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December 14, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Astrobiology and Stardust

Carl Sagan once said “We are all star stuff.� But how? What does that really mean? One of the fundamental questions of astrobiology, how does life originate and evolve?, provides a structure in which to examine the relationship between life and the cosmos. Everywhere life has been found on Earth, which is essentially every place in which it has been sought, life’s intimate connection with water has also been found. Within the framework of contemplating life’s cosmic origins, one must also ask about the history of water on Earth. NASA’s Stardust mission has provided the opportunity for astrobiologists to gain deeper insight into this history.

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December 14, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Oxygen and Life in the Precambrian

The December 2006 issue of Geobiology is a collection of papers focusing on the history of Earth’s biogeochemistry, from the earliest sedimentary rocks in Greenland to the late Proterozoic. The rise of atmospheric oxygen provides a thematic link. The papers in this issue, edited by David Catling and Roger Buick of NAI’s University of Washington Alumni Team, grew out of a session of the Earth System Processes 2 conference in Calgary, Canada, 8–11 August 2005, sponsored by the NAI.

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November 27, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Romer's Gap Confirmed

Peter Ward from NAI’s Alumni Team at the University of Washington and his collaborators have a new paper out in PNAS this week providing supportive evidence for Romer’s Gap. Their results link this gap in vertebrate terrestrialization with a low atmospheric oxygen interval. This paper supports Ward’s new book on the evolution of effective respiratory systems, entitled “Out of Thin Air.”

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October 25, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Impact from the Deep

Strangling heat and gases emanating from the earth and sea, not asteroids, most likely caused several ancient mass extinctions. Peter Ward from NAI’s Alumni Team at the University of Washington asks in this week’s Scientific American: “Could the same killer-greenhouse conditions build once again?”

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October 19, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Planets Around the Stars

Researchers from NAI’s University of Washington, University of Colorado, Boulder, and Virtual Planetary Laboratory Teams have developed models testing planet formation in four known systems, 55 Cancri, HD 38529, HD 37124 and HD 74156. Placing Mars to Moon-sized planet embryos between giant planets and allowing them to evolve for 100 million years, they found terrestrial planets formed readily in 55 Cancri, sometimes with substantial water and orbits in the system’s habitable zone. They found HD 38529 is likely to support an asteroid belt and Mars-sized or smaller bodies but no notable terrestrial planets. No planets formed in HD 37124...

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July 25, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Earlier Evolution of Oxygenic Photosynthesis - Surviving Snowball Earth

Roger Buick from NAI’s University of Washington Team and his colleagues report in the current issue of Geology their analysis of oil-bearing fluid inclusions in 2.45 billion year old rocks from Canada. They assert that the oil is derived from an overlying formation, becoming trapped in the host rock before 2.2 billion years ago – prior to the Great Oxidation Event. Abundant biomarkers for cyanobacteria and eukaryotes were identified in the study, suggesting that aqueous environments at the time had become sufficiently oxygenated for sterol biosynthesis to occur, and implying that organisms had the ability to survive “snowball Earth”...

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June 14, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Chance to View Stardust Return

NASA’s Stardust mission is nearing Earth after a four billion kilometer round-trip journey to bring back comet dust samples. Viewers in California, Oregon, and Nevada have a chance to see the fiery entry of the return capsule into Earth’s atmosphere in the early morning of Sunday January 15 (approximately 2 a.m. PST, 3 a.m. MST).

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January 10, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe

A New Book from NAI's Peter Ward

Prolific author Peter Ward leads the pack, speculating on “Life As We Do Not Know It…” The book contains a wealth of information and dazzling speculation drawn from the ranks of Ward’s colleagues in the 16 research institutions that operate worldwide as NASA’s Astrobiology Institute.

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November 21, 2005 / Posted by: Shige Abe

The Origin of Planetary Impactors in the Inner Solar System

Scientists from NAI’s University of Arizona and University of Washington Lead Teams recently published a paper in Science concerning this history of the Solar System. Their paper looks at differences in the size distrubutions of asteroid populations during and after the heavy bombardment period ~ 3.8 billion years ago.

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October 13, 2005 / Posted by: Shige Abe

Teaching Evolution

Peter Ward of the University of Washington, the leader of the UW NAI Team, addresses the current attack on teaching evolution by an analogy with teaching students that the Earth is flat. Ward writes that “I teach evolution at the University of Washington. Even at the college level, it is a very difficult and demanding subject, and its abundant proofs require a detailed understanding of genetics, molecular biochemistry and paleontology. But for those who have made the intellectual journey to master these concepts, the stark explanatory power first realized by Charles Darwin more than 150 years ago shows clearly...

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September 15, 2005 / Posted by: Shige Abe