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Project Reports

• Adaptation to Salinity in Microbial Communities

  The potential relevance of evaporative lakes as analogs for the late stage hydrosphere of Mars (see results of Manga and collaborators in the UC Berkeley team) is well established (e.g., Benison and Laclair 2003, Astrobiology v.3).

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 3.2 4.1 5.3 7.2

• Planetary Biology, Evolution, and Intelligence

  The results of a two and a half day workshop on the topic of the Habitability of Planets Orbiting M Stars was published recently. Thirty scientists from nineteen institutions in the US and UK participated. Thirteen of the participants were from six other NAI Teams

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 1.2 2.1 2.2 3.1 3.2 4.1 4.2 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 6.2 7.1 7.2

• Construction of a Borehole Apparatus for Sampling of Fluids and Microbes in Sub-Permafrost Groundwater, Nunavut Territory, Canada

  As part of the Indiana-Princeton-Tennessee Astrobiology Initiative, investigating physical and chemical limitations of life on earth with potential application for life-detecting strategies on Mars, Barry Freifeld at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab designed and constructed a borehole sampling device intended for installation at the High Lake project site (67°22’N, 110°50’W). This device will allow for long-term sampling of geofluids (gas and water) and microbes in an extreme groundwater environment.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 5.1 5.2 5.3

• Iron Oxidation – Shaping the Past and Present Environments

   

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 7.2

• Ecosystem to Biosphere Modeling

   

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.1 5.3 6.1 7.2

• Earthbound Microbial and Geological Robotic Based Observations for Mars

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 5.1 5.3

• Drilling a Borehole for Sampling of Gases, Water, and Microbes in Sub-Permafrost Groundwater at High Lake, Nunavut Territory, Canada

   

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 6.2

• Examination of the Microbial Diversity Found in Ice Cores (Brenchley)

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 6.2 7.1

• Functional Genomics of Thioredoxins in Halobacterium Sp. NRC-1

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 3.2 5.1 5.3

• Microbial Diversity in the Deep Ocean

  Microbial life exerts a profound influence on habitability of Earth where it drives all of the major biogeographical transformations including the fixation of carbon and production of atmospheric gases.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1

• Identifying Microbial Life at Crustal Rock-Water Interfaces

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 7.1

• Project 5. Life in Extreme Environments

  The research objectives of Co-Investigator John Baross continue to focus on the microbial and biogeochemical characterization of Earth environments that share geophysical and geochemical characteristics with other planetary systems. The emphasis of Baross and his team is on magma-hosted and peridotite-hosted hydrothermal systems and subseafloor rock-hosted ecosystems affected by hydrothermal activity.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 3.1 5.1 5.3 6.2

• Evolution of Abiotic Environments to Ecosystems

  Field work in 2006-2007 included trips to the high Arctic and to the Precambrian Canadian Shield. Study sites were selected on the basis of temperature and contrasting levels of hydrogen. Study sites included environments impacted by permafrost and environments at latitudes south of persistent permafrost. The level of free hydrogen gas is temperature-dependent and appears to be an important controlling factor on microbial processes.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 3.1 3.2 3.3 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 6.2 7.1 7.2

• Interplanetary Pioneers

  We conducted fieldwork to four sites in extreme environments. This consisted of field trips to the Bolivian Andes (Dec 2006, Feb 2007. At the altitudes where we sampled (~15,000 feet), the ozone column was substantially reduced, resulting in high levels of UV radiation flux.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 5.3 6.2

• Experimental Study of Radiolytic Oxidation of Pyrite as a Source of Sulfate and Hydrogen to Sustain Microbial Metabolism

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 3.1 3.3 5.3 6.1 6.2

• Chemistry and Biology of Ultramafic-Hosted Alkaline Springs

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 5.3

• Project 6. Molecular and Isotopic Biosignatures

  Differences in carbon isotope ratios of co-occurring dolomite, carbonate fluorapatite, and organic matter in Paleoproterozoic stromatolitic phosphorites from the Aravalli Supergroup, India, suggest elevated primary productivity during sedimentation. Postdoctoral Fellow Dominic Papineau’s research provides a basis for the examination of other Paleoproterozoic phosphorites and a contribution to the identification of biosignatures in phosphatic sediments.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 3.1 4.1 4.2 5.3 6.1 6.2 7.1 7.2

• Genomics of Sulfidic Cave Extremophiles (Supplement to NNA04CC06A)

  Fieldwork and sampling for geochemistry and microbial genomics was conducted in four sulfidic cave systems hosting extreme acidophile communities, the Frasassi Caves and Grotta Nuova del Rio Garaffo in Italy, and Cueva de Villa Luz and Cueva Luna Azufre in Mexico.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 5.1 5.3 6.2

• Project 7. Astrobiotechnology

  Co-Investigator Andrew Steele and colleagues have continued to develop the Modular Assays for Solar System Exploration (MASSE) concept, which uses microfluidic technology to incubate a DNA or protein microarray. This year has been a milestone in the use of this technology in space with involvement in two missions, one to the International Space Station (ISS) aboard the STS 116 shuttle launch, the other a Biopan low earth orbit exposure mission that will launch in September.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 3.1 3.2 4.2 5.3 6.2 7.1

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

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 3.3 4.2 5.1 5.3

• Molecular Survey of Microbial Diversity in Hypersaline Ecosystems

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 3.4 4.1 4.2 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 6.2 7.1

• Retentostat Studies of Subsurface Sulfate Reducing Bacterium

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 6.2 7.1 7.2

• Hydrology and Microbiology of Active Springs

  Sulfur springs have traditionally provided an excellent framework within which to study microbial communities in the contexts of their geochemical environments. We have investigated a sulfur spring network that has multiple discharge sites along a fault, focusing on two sites (MS4 and MS11) that were chosen based on flow rate, chemistry, and the presence of eye-visible white biofilms.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 5.2 5.3 7.2

• Iron and Sulfur-Based Biospheres and Their Biosignatures

  This collaborative project involves many members of the UC Berkeley-led NAI team as well as members of other teams and institutions internationally.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 4.1 5.1 5.2 5.3 7.2

• FMARS Long Duration Mission: A Simulation of Manned Mars Exploration in an Analogue Environment, Devon Island, Canada

  The FMARS Long Duration Mission (FXI-LDM) is an unprecedented Mars exploration simulation in the Mars analogue environment of the Canadian High Arctic. Six crewmembers spent four months under strict simulation conditions (limited water use, constrained diet, high-latency communications, no outside activity without simulated life-support equipment, etc.) conducting field research in and around Haughton Crater, a 39 million year old impact structure.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 4.3 5.3

• Survival Capability of a Cold-Loving Microbe in a Mars Simulation Chamber

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 5.1 5.2 5.3 7.1

• Understanding the Microbial Ecology of Geologically-Based Chemolithoautotrophic Communities

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 5.3

• Geomicrobiology of Neutrophilic Iron-Oxidizing Bacteria at Loihi Seamount

  Loihi Seamount is a submarine, active volcano located on the SE flanks of the Big Island of Hawaii, and it is considered to be the youngest volcano in the Hawaiian chain.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1

• Search for Biomarker Gases on Mars

  Our team is engaged in a search for local sources of methane, water, and other biomarker gases on Mars, and for associated chemical species, using astronomical remote sensing techniques. We acquire simultaneous maps of atmospheric gases in the key infrared spectral region (wavelengths 3.0 – 3.8 μm) where aliphatic and aromatic organic gases have strong vibrational bands.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 5.3 6.2 7.1

• Rapid Response to Remotely Detected Seafloor Eruptions

  This project is an on-going study of the microbial and geochemical changes associated with seafloor eruptions at mid-ocean ridges. The intrusion of a magma dike into the neovolcanic zone of a mid-ocean ridge is the “quantum” event in the accretion of the upper ocean crust. Such ridge axis diking/eruptive events are episodic perturbations that trigger a sequence of interrelated and rapidly evolving physical, chemical, and biological processes associated with the formation of ocean crust.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.1 5.3 6.1

• Subseafloor Basement (Basalt) Biosphere Studies

  Low temperature hydrothermal ocean fluids (<100°C), circulate everywhere within the porous and permeable volcanic rocks of the upper ocean basement, providing temperatures and chemical gradients that form plausible habitats for a variety of microbial communities. However, few direct tests have been carried out in buried basement rocks or fluids.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 3.3 4.1 5.1 5.2 5.3 6.1 6.2