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Project Reports

• Experimental Study of Radiolytic Oxidation of Pyrite: Implications for Mars-Relevant Crustal Processes

  In subsurface environments, radiolysis can produce gradients of both electron acceptors and electron donors that are possible sources of metabolic energy [2]. Radiation-induced chemical reactions have particular significance in geologic environments where molecular oxygen derived from the atmosphere is a negligible input.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 3.3 4.1 4.2 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 7.2

• Origins and Signatures of Biogenic Hydrocarbons – Controls on the Transition From Abiogenic Geochemistry to Biotic Systems in the Deep Subsurface and Identification of Signature for Life

  Studies of deep subsurface, ecosystems hosted by ancient groundwater are directly relevant to the exploration for extant life in the subsurface of Mars. Laboratory investigations focus on determining the types of prebiotic compounds that form in the subsurface and assessing whether life itself could have been spawned beneath a planet’s surface. Field investigations focus on deep subsurface groundwater sampled at commercial mines in South African and Canadian Archaean rocks.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 2.1 3.1 4.1 4.2 6.1 7.1 7.2

• Microbial and Biogeochemical Characterization of Terrestrial Analogue Sites for Life in the Subsurface of Mars.

  Onstott and McGown collected ground water from boreholes intersection fractures at depths of 890 and 1100 meters below the surface at the Lupin gold mine, Nunavat Territories March 2005 using 0.2 μm borosilicate filters and 0.2 μm hollow-fiber filters and running the borehole water through these filters for 2-3 day

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 6.2 7.1

• Understanding Mars Subsurface Methane Hydrates and Brines and Potentials for Microbial Habitats

  The sub-permafrost zone of Mars is acknowledged as having the greatest potential for habitability because water is readily available. CH₄ leakage from the sub-permafrost zone would occur wherever the permafrost zone has been breached by recent fracturing due to impacts or by geothermal heating.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.1 4.3 5.3 6.1 6.2

• Design and Assembly of a Cavity-Ring Down Spectrometer for Determination of Concentration and Isotopic Composition of Methane in Gases

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 3.2 3.3 4.1 5.2 5.3 6.2 7.1 7.2

• Laser Fluorometry for Remote Detection of Oxygenic Phototrophs on Earth And, Potentially, on Mars.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 3.3 4.2 5.1 5.3

• Synergism, Evolution, and Functional Ecogenomics of Deep-Subsurface Microbial Communities Based on Molecular Analyses

  Planktonic microbes in anaerobic fracture water and biofilm microbial communities on aerobic rock surfaces were compared from the deep subsurface of the Witwatersrand Basin, South Africa. A deep-branching clade of nearly identical Firmicutes 16S rDNA sequences (>99% homology) has been identified as the dominant microorganism in fracture water from multiple gold mines of the Witwatersrand Basin, South Africa

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1