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Executive Summary

Executive Summary of NAI Team
Karen J. Meech
2010 Annual Report
Reporting Period: September 1, 2009 – August 31, 2010

Overview

Water is the medium in which the chemistry of all life on Earth takes place. It is likely to be equally important for Astrobiology in general. It is the theme we chose for the first five years of the Univer-sity of Hawai’i (UH) NAI (CAN 3) and it is the theme we proposed for CAN5. Like our earlier effort, this proposal combines a set of studies that range from the interstellar medium to the interior of planet Earth, all designed to elucidate ``the origin, history, and distribution of water and its relation to life in the Universe”, and the relation to Habitable Worlds. However, our focus has changed to highlight those areas of research that can make the most use of interdisciplinary approaches. The research areas are as follows:

• We don’t know where the water on Earth came from. It may be that the water arrived trapped as gas on dust grains as the planet accumulated mass, or it may have formed via chemical reactions on the early magma ocean, or water may have been delivered exogene-ously. Understanding the relative roles of each source will require astronomical observa-tions, ice laboratory experiments, chemical and dynamical models as well as geochemical observations. The D/H ratio of Earth, including its bulk value in the mantle, crust, and hydro-sphere, and its primordial value in the deep mantle, using rocks from the Hawai’i and Iceland mantle plumes and measurements of nominally anhydrous and hydrous phases synthesized in the laboratory and thought to be important reservoirs of water in the mantle;

• The D/H ratio in protoplanetary disks and comets will be explored using ground-based tele-scopes on Mauna Kea coupled with chemical modeling of hot corinos (young star forming cores) and comets, to understand how this ratio varies with space, time, and chemical spe-cies within young stellar systems;

• We will explore ice chemistry in our Solar System, using ultra-high vacuum, ultra-cold labora-tory experiments, astronomical observations, and modeling to understand how primitive materials are processed as the system evolves, leading to life’s precursor molecules;

• The Main Belt Comets, as representatives of a novel class of icy bodies that may have con-tributed water to Earth, represent a unique and accessible source of volatiles. We will use the new Pan STARRS 1 telescope on Haleakala, Maui to survey the sky for more members of this class, and then follow the discoveries by characterizing the activity, and physical proper-ties of these bodies. The intent is that this will lead to the development of an in-situ space mission concept.

• Thermal and aqueous evolution of the parent bodies of primitive chondritic meteorites will be investigated using the Cameca 1280 ion microprobe at UH to measure oxygen isotopes and the daughter products of short-lived radionuclides, to elucidate the history of ices and water on these bodies that may have contributed the major amount of water to Earth;

• We will explore the microbial habitats in Earth’s subseafloor environments, along the mid-ocean ridge axis and flanks and in subduction zones, as likely analogues for extraterrestrial habitats for life on basaltic and ultramafic substrates, in our Solar System and beyond;

• The VYSOS project telescopes in Hawai’i and Chile will survey tens of thousands of young stars for a decade or longer, to understand how stars and planetary systems form and to search for newborn transiting planets;

• Amino acid combinations and their effect on protein folding will be investigated, using theo-retical modeling to resolve why most terrestrial life uses a highly restricted set of only 20 amino acids;

• We also propose to create a new, integrative knowledge framework for doing research in as-trobiology, based on open XML standards, that will enable interdisciplinary collaboration, not only at UH but at the NAI as a whole.

The Team and Infrastructure

Personnel – During this reporting period we added three new postdocs to our existing team of ninepostdoctoral fellows, and we added three graduate students to the four already working with our team. These new members include:

• Lydia Hallis – lunar and mars volatiles (cosmochemistry) – working with Jeff Taylor
• Kaori Jogo – working on chronology of the early solar system (cosmochemistry) and aqueous alteration – with G. Huss and S. Krot
• Stephen Brotton – Nanoparticle Levitator project, ice chemistry
• Patrick Gasda – working with Jeff Taylor and Shiv Sharma
• Christy Jilly – working with Jeff Taylor
• Katherine Robinson – working with Jeff Taylor

We have also expanded our group of official collaborators to include

• Jonathan Awaya – Univ. Hawaii at Hilo – Specialty in characterizing unique genetic and bio-chemical pathways in bacteria and Identification/characterization of un-culturable microor-ganism from Hawaiian sediments.
• Jocelyne DiRuggiero – Johns Hopkins University – Specializing in extremophiles (psychro-philes), with interest in the microbial diversity of microorganisms in extreme environments, in the evolutionary mechanisms that drive genome alteration in response to environmental changes, and in the molecular mechanisms of DNA repair and stress response.
• Ken Hon – Volcanologist interested in basaltic volcanoes and large ash-flow caldera erup-tions.
• Anupam Misra – Univ. Hawaii – specializing in Raman techniques and astrobiology instru-mentation
• Shiv Sharma – Univ. Hawaii – Specializing in instrumentation development for remote sens-ing and astrobiology. In particular, his work focuses on Raman and IR spectrometry of mete-orites and terrestrial minerals. Mentoring the thesis of NAI graduate student Patrick Gasda.

Infrastructure – The Keck Ice Chemistry Laboratory is progressing extremely well (see figure). In the mean time, many of the ice experiments can be carried out using the existing ultra high vacuum lab facilities. We have also been developing a new nano particle levitation facility for the ice chemistry group. One of their main goals within the framework of UHNAI is to investigate the formation and stability of astrobiologically important molecules in astrophysically relevant ices (ISM, KBOs, com-ets). For this, the main challenge is to prepare well-defined samples of the biomolecules (amino ac-ids, DNA/RNA nitrogen bases) in water ice and to expose them to ionizing radiation. The first part generated major problems. First, we attempted to sublime the biomolecules. Due to the nature of our UHV system, this led to significant contamination of the chamber walls with bio molecules. Sec-ondly, we tried to press powder of biomolecules (glycine, adenine) on a silver wafer. However, the ill-defined grain size made an interpretation of the IR and UV spectra very difficult. Consequently, we have to develop a novel experimental set up to prepare and to characterize nanoparticles of bio- molecules which can be co-condensed in astrophysically relevant ices.

The Pan STARRS 1 survey telescope was commissioned in May 2010. The VYSOS (Variable Young Stellar Objects Survey) telescope facility had been completed and has begun operations, although there have been some developmental problems that the team has been working through. VYSOS has started to survey star-forming regions.

Science Accomplishments

The last of our first year postdoctoral fellow hires arrived during the summer and fall of 2009, and we were then fully staffed to being our research programs. We began to integrate the group with our Astrobiology research seminars.

One of our big interdisciplinary projects is looking at the origin of earth’s water, and this pro-ject saw a lot of activity this year, including measurements of samples collected in Iceland during 2008, characterization of a new class of objects in the main asteroid belt, the Main Belt Comets (MBCs), to development of a Discovery class mission to take an in-situ look at material which may have brought water to earth. We have carried out the first round of D/H measurements on a suite of samples from Iceland and found that they had been partially degassed. We currently are working to develop techniques to re-homogenize the samples, and are planning for possible acquisition of additional samples from Iceland. We have begun testing our MBC detection algorithms on new data that began to flow from the Pan STARRS 1 survey telescope at the beginning g of the year, while several team members were focusing on the characterization of the known MBCS. During 2010 several new MBC candidates were discovered and there was a concerted effort to secure observa-tions on these objects, and this is resulting in the development of several papers. One, which was classified as an MBC by its orbit and appearance, C/2010 A2 LINEAR, turned out to in fact be an as-teroid collision. We recruited a Hubble Fellow to come work with our team in the area of MBC characterization, one of the discoverers of this class of object.

During this year, much of the focus of our ice chemistry group has been in getting the Keck Astrochemistry laboratory set up. Because the extensive rennovations that are necessary for the lab building hosting this facilitiy are still underway, most of the work has been in component testing for the machine, rather than in conducting experiments. Members of the ice chemistry group, in particular C. Bennett have visited other facilities (advanced light sources) to conduct experimental work, and we have been hosting visitors who have wished to used our solid state machine.

Many in our team have been extremely successful with icy body astronomical observations, looking at distant comets and their activity, characterizing small body mission targets to help inter-pret space mission data, and looking for aqueous alteration features in asteroids. In addition, we have had some spectacular work in the area of extra solar planet observations, where team mem-ber N. Hagighipour was part of a team using the Keck observatory to discover a new planet, Gliese 581g, with has a mass 3-4 times that of earth. Likely a rocky planet, the surface temperatures are such that liquid water could exist. B. Reipurth along with J. Walawender have continued their devel-opment of the VYSOS astronomical survey facility on the Big Island, in ordero to understand the photometric variability of young sun-like stars.

In the area of theory, team member G. Sarid has been doing extensive modeling of thermal evolution of small icy bodies to understand the ice lifetime in their orbits, and the mechanisms for aqueous alteration. These models are integrally connected to observations of aqueous alteration seen in the meteorite record and in the astronomical record, and will play a role in the interpreta-tion of astronomical remote sensing and in-situ observations of comets.
In the area of seafloor observatories and the exploration of the deep biosphere, team mem-bers Jim Cowen and A. Robador participated in a 2 week cruise to study the sediment buried base-ment biosphere, developing and advanced instrument to allow for incubation of liquid samples at high bpressures and temperatures to enable discrete sampling along the cruise. A new IODP obser-vatory network in the NE Pacific was also set up in collaboration with others for initiation of large sale cross hole experiments.

S. Freeland and G. Phillip have performed a series of analyses to investigate life’s choice of amino acids to investigate whether life had an optimization scheme in terms of the physicochemical properties for selecting these. Work is expanding to take a broader look at pre-biotic availability of these amino acids.

Finally, in order to expose the interdisciplinary roots and applications of astrobiology, we’re developing the Astrobiology Integrative Research Framework (AIRFrame; website: Team members have created the initial data model and have identified the relevant databases that will be used. In the current phase of the project, we’re investigating how astrobiology is represented in the scien-tific literature of amino acids, the first step toward creating an ontology of astrobiologically relevant terms and relationships across diverse fields of study. Researchers will be able to use AIRFrame to discover and integrate existing knowledge, data sets and terminology from disciplines beyond their own. This is forming the basis of a master’s thesis. During this reporting period resesarchers har-vested over 2000 publications in astrobiology and ave begun testing machine learning methods and visualization software. (http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/airframe/).

Educational and Public Outreach Activities

The Hawai’i team was very active in the area of Education and Public Outreach. We have a good mix of formal and informal education activities, including university level courses and seminars, stu-dent and teacher summer school programs, as well as public activities.

Middle and High School Programs – We offered our student teacher summer residence program, HISTAR (Hawaii Student Teacher Astronomy Research) from June 4-9, 2010 wherein teachers and middle-high school students work with astronomer mentors to develop skills necessary for conduct-ing original research projects suitable for entry in school science fairs. Our ALI’I summer teacher program for professional development for secondary science teachers was hosted at the University of Hawaii from June 27-July 2, 2010. Associated with the preparation for the summer program were numerous workshops across the islands. These programs are leading to well-received astrobiology projects in the annual Hawaii State Science Fairs.

Programs for the Public – Our team participated with astrobiology activities lead by N. Schorghofer and S. Freeland at the Physics open house in November 2009. On April 18, 2010 the Institute for Astronomy held its annual Open House event, and the UHNAI contributed strongly to the event. Team members gave public lectures that were relevant to astrobiology, including: “Is Life on Earth a Cosmic Accident”” (Steve Freeland), “The Birth of the Solar System” (Jonathan Williams), “Other Worlds Around Other Stars” (Mike Liu). In addition, we had an Astrobiology exhibit, including post-ers, brochures, and a hands-on “microbial mat slime cave”, and some remote operation deep sea simulation equipment for children. In addition, open house participants were able to build their own comets and learn about primordial ices in the solar system.

Public Evening Lecture & Other Public Talks – Visitor Steve Mojzsis (Univ. CO alumni team) partici-pated in a public talk for nearly 200 people along with team members Karen Meech, and Jeff Taylor March 31, 2010. Steve Freeland moderated, and each speaker gave a different view of how the Earth became habitable, followed by audience discussion. For the fall public event, we decided to try a different format to get the audience more engaged. Sabbatical visitor Steven Desch along with team members Karen Meech, Jeff Taylor, and Steve Freeland planned to feature the astrobiology theme of “What are Odds of Intelligent Life and Civilization in the Galaxy?” in the form of a popular game show – to be held November 17, 2010.

Star and Planet Formation Day – On December 3, 2009, Bo Reipurth held one of his Center for Star and Planet Formation Day in Hilo, bringing together a set of interdisciplinary talks focusing on issues of star and planet formation.

International Collaborations – PI K. Meech visited our Scottish network of collaborators from Heriot-Watt University and Jane Greave at St. Andrews to begin discussions of collaboration for education and outreach activities.

Nordic Graduate Summer School – At 1.5 year intervals, in collaboration with the Nordic Astrobiol-ogy Network, the UH NAI team will host winter schools and summer schools in astrobiology for graduate students and early career astrobiologists. Our first summer school was held in Rejkjavik Iceland from June 29-July 13 for 43 participants. During 2010 we have been planning for the next joint school, a winter school to be held in Hawaii, Jan 3-16, 2011. As in 2009, the theme for the 2011 school was “Water, Ice and the Origin of Life in the Universe” and was a blend of lectures, hands on activities, discussions, fieldwork. Applications were received and evaluated during the summer, and we have selected 40 participants from a pool of 120 applicants, and will be hosting early career postdocs and graduate students from 12 countries.

Astrobiology Courses – The UHNAI team offered an Astrobiology seminar during spring 2010 which highlighted team research, as well as an undergraduate astrobiology course which was taught by K. Meech with help from S. Freeland. We are beginning to explore new courses and team teaching courses utilizing the skills of our team members. To this extent, G. Huss developed a new Cosmo-chemistry course – a survey of cosmochemistry, including early Solar System chronology, solar neb-ula processes, asteroidal processes, planet compositions and planetary crustal evolution. In addi-tion faculty from astronomy and the Hawaiian Institute of Geophysics departments have been dis-cussing a revision and possible team joint teaching of the graduate solar system course. We are setting up to begin offering a certificate program in astrobiology, hopefully to be implemented within the next year.

Other Activities

Visitor Program – Our team has a rigorous visitor program, where we can invite collaborators from other NAI teams to Hawaii to work with our team, and we provide housing in our visitor apartment. Each visitor that we support also participates in our astrobiology seminar series. A summary of the visitors we hosted during this reporting period is shown below, along with a preview of those who will be coming (in lighter font) for whom we have made arrangements:

• E. Melchiorre (Cal State Univ; Dec 2009) – working with G. Huss on the Ion probe to finish up work started on his MIRS sabbatical with our team
• D. Prialnik (Tel Aviv Univ.; Feb 2010) – Worked with several on our team to investigate small body thermal evolution. This has resulted in the submission of 1 paper on longevity of ice in Main Belt Comets.
• D. Papineau (Carnegie team; Feb. 2010) – came out to use our 1280 SIMS instrumentation through an NAI scholarship to work with Gary Huss on oxygen apatites in Precambrian banded iron formation.
• H. Hsieh (Queen’s Univ; Feb 2010) – preparations for his Hubble Fellowship that he will be bringing to Hawaii, and collaboration on main belt comet observations
• T. Thordarson (Edinburgh Univ; Feb 2010) – Icelandic sample preparation for ion probe work with Huss, Meech and Binsted on Origin of Earth Ocean project. Many of the tea postdocs and grad students were trained in the initial stages of the sample preparation.
• J. Smyth (Univ. CO; Mar 2010) – came out to collaborate with Gary Huss and use the ion probe to investigate hydrogen in nominally anhydrous minerals.
• O. Abramov & S. Mojzsis (U. CO; Mar 2010) – Early Earth Habitability – DDF funding and par-ticipation in public event
• M. Hartley (Univ. Edinburgh) – Thesis student of T. Thordarson, came for a 5 week visit to begin the assessment of the Icelandic D/H samples. After her visit, the UHNAI team has agreed to sponsor a joint fellowship with the Univ. of Edinburgh to support continued work on these samples.
• S. Desch (ASU; Fall 2010) – setting up a collaboration with ASU team for a sabbatical visit to work on early solar system aqueous processes, thermal modeling and comet observations (Krot, Keil, Scott, Meech, Sarid)
• Kathryn Altwegg (U. Bern) – is planning part of her sabbatical visit in Hawaii to work with Toby Owen, Karen Meech and Timm Riesen on issues related to comet missions. We are planning to have a special space exploration seminar series in conjunction with her visit.
• Mario Melita (U. Buenos Aires) – coming to work with G. Sarid on a joint observing and small body modeling project.
• Gianfranco Vidali (Syracuse Univ.; Dec, 2010) – coming to work with Ralf Kaiser and Chris Bennett to study the formation of water via the implantation of protons in silicates.

NAI Executive Council Meeting

The summer in-person NAI EC meeting was held in Hawaii on the Big Island, at the Kilauea Military Camp at the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. Participants stayed in low-cost military housing, and our meeting was hosted in one of the facility conference rooms. We selected the venue because of its proximity to the area of astrobiological interest, and because we wanted to use the opportunity to further our collaboration with the National Parks begun with the Ames Team and their work in replacing signs in Yellowstone. During the afternoon of the first day of the meeting we had presen-tations from 4 team members:

• Karen Meech: Origin of Water on Earth and a Mission to the Asteroid Belt
• Steve Freeland: Understanding Life’s Choice of Amino Acids
• Kim Binsted: The Computational Astrobiology Summer School, Current and Future
• Jeff Taylor: Highly Volatile Elements and Water in Mars, Earth and the Moon

Just before lunch on the second day, we had a presentation from UHNAI Collaborator Ken Hon, a volcanologist from the University of Hawaii at Hilo, giving us an overview of the Kilauea Volcanic System, and this was followed by a tour of the park, including getting into lava tubes to look at mi-crobial life.

Flight Mission Involvement

UHNAI Team members are actively observing the mission target, comet 103P/Hartley 2 to charac-terize the nucleus 
prior to the Nov. 4 2010 encounter. We have recovered the comet, and observed the rotation period prior to the onset
of activity and have used Spitzer observations to estimate the nucleus size and albedo. We will be watching the development
of activity as the comet comes out of solar conjunction and is again visible during spring 2010. PI K. Meech has been coordinating the world’s earth-based observers for the campaign, as was done for the Deep Impact mission.

UHNAI team members in collaboration with a cadre of international observers are providing precise measurements of the
rotation period for the mission target, comet 9P/Tempel 1, to enable arrival at the comet at a time when the impact crater
made by the Deep Impact event will be facing the spacecraft on Feb. 14, 2011.

Finally, in collaboration with the Jet Propulsion laboratory, UHNAI team members lead by K. Meech and drawing upon an interdisciplinary team from the departments of Astronomy, Oceanography, and from the Hawaiian Institute of Geophysics and Planetology, have developed a NASA Discovery mission project proposing to have an in-situ exploration of a Main Belt Comet to further understand their connection to the origin of water on Earth.