2005 Annual Science Report
Astrobiology Roadmap Objective 4.3 Reports Reporting | JUL 2004 – JUN 2005
Roadmap Objective 4.3—Effects of extraterrestrial events upon the biosphere
Project Reports
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An Astronomical Search for the Essential Ingredients for Life: Placing Our Habitable System in Context.
Module 1: The Building Blocks of Life
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 1.2 3.1 3.2 4.3 -
Subsurface Biospheres
Members of our team at UNC Chapel Hill focus on molecular studies of deep subsurface communities
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 4.1 4.3 5.2 5.3 6.1 7.1 7.2 -
Prebiotic Organics From Space
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 3.1 3.4 4.3 7.1 7.2 -
Mass Extinction Events, the Longest Snowball Earth Event, the Evolution of Oxygenic Photosynthesis, and TPW Induced Perturbations of the Carbon Cycle.
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 3.1 3.3 4.1 4.3 6.1 -
Habitable Planets
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 1.2 2.1 4.1 4.3 -
Darwinian Chemistry
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 4.1 4.2 4.3 5.2 5.3 6.1 6.2 7.1 -
From Stars to Genes: Addition to Extrasolar Planetary Systems
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 1.2 2.1 2.2 4.2 4.3 5.1 5.2 -
Geobiology and the Geochemistry of Early Earth
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.3 -
The Astrophysical Environment and Planetary Habitability
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.3 6.2 7.2 -
Causes of Mass Extinctions: Testing Impact Models
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.3 6.1 -
Electrochemical Isotope Effects With Applications to Stable Isotope Fractionation in Transition Metals
We have successfully begun a research program examining how electrochemical processes (e.g. electroplating, corrosion, biological metabolism) act on stable isotopes of transition metals, starting with Fe.
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 1.2 4.2 4.3 -
The Impact of Atmospheric Particles on Life
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 2.1 2.2 3.1 4.1 4.3 7.1 -
Causes of Mass Extinctions: Testing Impact Models_Kring
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 4.1 4.3 -
Lee Kump
This year we published a paper in Geology which proposed that episodic release of hydrogen sulfide (H2S ) from the ocean caused the end-Permian mass extinction. Moreover, we suggested that the underlying environmental driver, euxinic deep waters (enriched in H2S), may have been the norm during a billion years of Earth history (from 1.8 Ga to 0.8 Ga), and that H2S eruptions may have delayed colonization of the land surface
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 4.1 4.3 5.2 6.1 -
Earth’s Early Environment and Life
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.1 4.3 -
Impacts and Extinction
The project being reported on here deals with various aspects of asteroid or comet impact on the Earth, and the Astrobiological consequences (including extinction).
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.2 4.3 -
The Organic Volatile Composition of Comets: A Window on the Early Solar System
Our long-range objective is to establish a taxonomy for comets based on chemistry, rather than orbital dynamics. The formation temperature of a given comet can be constrained by measures of the ortho-para ratios in H2O and by the isotopic enhancements (e.g., in deuterium) in selected volatile species.
ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 2.1 3.1 4.1 4.3