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Project Reports

• Biosignatures in Chemosynthetic and Photosynthetic Systems

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 4.1 5.1 5.2 6.1 7.1 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

• 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

• Evolution of Atmospheric O2, Climate, and Biosphere (Ohmoto)

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 2.1 4.1 4.3 5.1 5.2 6.1 7.1

• 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

• Hindcasting Ecosystems

  Collaboration with Rothschild’s team lead to the discovery of short wavelength UV radiation on the earth’s surface. We recorded high levels of UV radiation in southern South America as Rothschild and Rogoff did in the Bolivian Altiplano.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 6.1

• 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

• 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

• 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

• 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

• 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

• Investigations of Modern Analogues of Precambrian Microbial Ecosystems

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 4.1 4.3 6.1

• Simulating Preservation of Amino Acids and Peptides in Evaporitic Sulfate Deposits on the Surface of Mars

  In anticipation of human exploration, analytical strategies are urgently needed to characterize organic molecules in chemical and clastic deposits inferred to be present on or near the surface of Mars.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 2.1 2.2 6.1 6.2 7.1

• Re-Tracing Steps Towards a Habitable World: The Biogeochemical Evolution of Sulfur on the Early Earth.

  In the last year, we have reported work on the origin of the crust from analysis of rare isotopes in Hadean zircons from Western Australia, established the ages of the oldest and best preserved sediments in Canada at Inukjuak (Quebec) and completed our analysis of multiple sulfur isotopes from the transition from an oxygen-poor to oxygen-rich surface across the Paleoproterozoic.

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 4.1 4.2 5.1 5.2 6.1

• Rise of Oxygen, Modern Analogs for Anoxic Oceans, and Effect of Early Life on Soil Development

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 1.1 4.1 4.3 6.1 7.1 7.2

• 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

• In Situ Voltammetry Integrated With a Cabled Nearshore Observatory

  ROADMAP OBJECTIVES: 5.1 6.1

• 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