MARSBUGS: The Electronic Exobiology Newsletter Volume 5, Number 2, 11 February, 1998. Editors: David Thomas, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Idaho, Moscow, ID, 83844-3051, USA, thoma457@uidaho.edu or Marsbugs@aol.com. Julian Hiscox, Division of Molecular Biology, IAH Compton Laboratory, Berkshire, RG20 7NN, UK. Julian.Hiscox@bbsrc.ac.uk or Marsbug@msn.com MARSBUGS is published on a weekly to quarterly basis as warranted by the number of articles and announcements. Copyright of this compilation exists with the editors, except for specific articles, in which instance copyright exists with the author/authors. E- mail subscriptions are free, and may be obtained by contacting either of the editors. Contributions are welcome, and should be submitted to either of the two editors. Contributions should include a short biographical statement about the author(s) along with the author(s)' correspondence address. Subscribers are advised to make appropriate inquiries before joining societies, ordering goods etc. Back issues may be obtained via anonymous FTP at: ftp.uidaho.edu/pub/mmbb/marsbugs. The purpose of this newsletter is to provide a channel of information for scientists, educators and other persons interested in exobiology and related fields. This newsletter is not intended to replace peer-reviewed journals, but to supplement them. We, the editors, envision MARSBUGS as a medium in which people can informally present ideas for investigation, questions about exobiology, and announcements of upcoming events. Exobiology is still a relatively young field, and new ideas may come out of the most unexpected places. Subjects may include, but are not limited to: exobiology proper (life on other planets), the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI), ecopoeisis/ terraformation, Earth from space, planetary biology, primordial evolution, space physiology, biological life support systems, and human habitation of space and other planets. ------------------------------------------------------------------ INDEX 1) LATEST RESEARCH CASTS NEW DOUBT ON EVIDENCE FOR FOSSIL LIFE IN MARTIAN METEORITE Stanford University News Service 2) PLANETARY SOCIETY EXPEDITION TO BELIZE GOES ON LINE Planetary Society release 3) ANTARCTICA EXPEDITION ONLINE by Jim Bladen 4) MARS GLOBAL SURVEYOR FLIGHT STATUS REPORT JPL release 5) ADDITIONAL EXPERIMENTS SELECTED FOR MARS 2001 MISSIONS NASA release 98-13 6) SYMPOSIUM ON MARS SAMPLE RETURN MISSION AT AAAS MEETING NASA note N98-12 7) NASA COMET AND JUPITER MISSIONS OFFER EDUCATOR FELLOWSHIPS JPL release 8) CALL FOR ARTICLES FOR NEW COSMOS MAGAZINE by Alex Michael Bonnici ------------------------------------------------------------------ LATEST RESEARCH CASTS NEW DOUBT ON EVIDENCE FOR FOSSIL LIFE IN MARTIAN METEORITE Stanford University News Service 21 January, 1998 New analyses of the famous Martian meteorite, ALH84001, have cast additional doubt on the likelihood that it contains the fossilized remains of ancient Martian microbes. Two studies published last week find that much of the organic material in the meteorite appears to be terrestrial, rather than extraterrestrial, in origin. Richard Zare, the Marguerite Blake Wilbur Professor of Chemistry at Stanford who headed the team that discovered organic material of possible Martian origin in the potato-sized rock, says that the new findings do not directly refute the original research. One of the analyses, however, does suggest that the meteorite contains considerably more terrestrial contamination than he had thought, Zare acknowledges. ALH84001 was thrust into the limelight in August 1996 when a team of scientists published a controversial analysis in the journal Science. They argued that they had discovered organic material, unusual mineralogical features and electron microscope images showing tiny oval and worm- shaped features that, when taken together, provided compelling circumstantial evidence that the meteorite was inhabited by Martian microorganisms more than three billion years ago. Scientists at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston provided the electron microscope images of the putative nanofossils. Researchers from the University of Georgia and McGill University contributed the mineralogical evidence. Zare's research group produced data showing that the meteorite contained a family of organic compounds called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) that could have been produced by the decomposition of alien microorganisms. In the 17 months since the research was announced, other scientists have published dozens of independent analyses that have both supported and attacked the Martian microbe hypothesis. In the last month, however, the weight of new research appears to be stacking up against the pro-life position. In December, John Bradley of MVA Inc. and Ralph Harvey of Case Western Reserve University published a paper in the journal Nature that attacked the NASA group's interpretation that the oval and worm-like shapes that it reported could be the fossils of microorganisms. Duplicating the NASA researchers' methods, Bradley and Harvey reported that all the shapes that they could find in the meteorite are non-biological in nature and consist of the fractured surfaces of common crystals. In the same issue of the journal, the NASA team strongly contested this interpretation. The two analyses of the organic material in the meteorite appeared in the January 16 issue of the journal Science. A team from Scripps Institution of Oceanography, headed by Jeffrey Bada, analyzed the meteorite for amino acids, the building blocks of life. They found amino acids present in very low concentrations (between 7 parts per million and 100 parts per billion). "What we found was that, yes, there are amino acids in the meteorite at very low levels, but they are clearly terrestrial and they look similar to amino acids we see in the surrounding Antarctic ice," Bada said in a Scripps news release. (The meteorite spent an estimated 13,000 years in the Antarctic ice before it was discovered.) Bada based his conclusion that the amino acids were due to terrestrial contamination on the results of an analytic technique called liquid chromatography. The method determines the "handedness" of the amino acids. Terrestrial organisms produce only left-handed amino acids, where non-biological processes produce a mixture of left- and right-handed molecules. Bada found that the amino acids in the meteorite were left- handed and so concludes that they must be terrestrial. There is at least a 50 percent chance, however, that Martian life (if it exists) would also favor left-handed molecules. So the experiment is by no means conclusive, Zare said. Even if the amino acids in the meteorite come from terrestrial contamination, Zare says this does not prove that the PAHs which his group found are also terrestrial in origin. "Amino acids are soluble in water. So water provides a mechanism for carrying them into the interior of the meteorite. But PAHs are highly insoluble and I don't know of any mechanism that would transport them into the rock's interior where we found them," he said. Zare finds the second analysis, performed by a University of Arizona research team headed by A. J. Timothy Jull, much more interesting and compelling. "It is state-of-the-art and an extremely valuable study of the degree of contamination in the meteorite," he said. Jull's group burned samples of the meteorite at two different temperatures to separate the organic carbon from the carbon contained in inorganic minerals, which burn off at higher temperatures. They then analyzed the isotopic ratios of the carbon from the two sources. In previous work, Jull had determined that the carbonates in ALH84001 are substantially enriched in the isotope carbon-13 compared to those on Earth. He and his colleagues interpret this as an indication that the carbon dioxide in the early Martian atmosphere was also enriched in carbon-13. If that is the case, then the tissue of Martian organisms would also have elevated levels of carbon-13. When the team analyzed the ratio of carbon isotopes in the organic carbon, however, it found that fully four- fifths of the material had the same isotopic signature as terrestrial carbon. The other 20 percent appears to have a preterrestrial origin, they found. "It looks like regular terrestrial organic material, with the exception of one small component in ALH84001," Jull said in a University of Arizona news release. The analysis "indicates a much greater degree of terrestrial contamination in the meteorite than I suspected was present two years ago," Zare said. "In that sense, Jull's study does cast new doubt on our hypothesis that the meteorite contains evidence of past Martian life." On the other hand, the Stanford chemist does not believe that the study completely rules out an extraterrestrial origin for the PAHs. "Jull's work is for the whole rock. As in real estate, location is everything. His study does not give any indication of the locations from which these different carbon isotope fractions are coming. So I cannot tell where the PAHs, which are concentrated around carbonate spheroids in the meteorite's interior, fall in the terrestrial or preterrestrial fraction." The saga of the provocative rock is far from over. Last summer NASA and the National Science Foundation awarded grants for 23 new investigations of AHL84001 as part of a coordinated program designed to determine whether it contains traces of alien life. These studies will be producing results in the next two to three years. Although it may be decades before the significance of the meteorite is determined conclusively, Zare sees several beneficial effects that are independent of the debate's ultimate outcome. These include a revitalization of research on meteorites, increased efforts to extend the boundaries of the scientific ability to measure trace quantities of chemical compounds in materials, and its illustration of the critical importance of multidisciplinary research. Most important, he says, it has given a major new impetus to research that addresses the closely related questions of "How did life begin on Earth?" and "Is there life beyond Earth?" A concrete example of this is NASA's decision to found a new $7 million to $10 million-per-year Astrobiology Institute specifically for this purpose. Zare is serving as chair of the search committee for the institute's first director. ------------------------------------------------------------------ PLANETARY SOCIETY EXPEDITION TO BELIZE GOES ON LINE Society Web Site Offers Daily Reports on Latest Expedition Investigating the Demise of the Dinosaurs Planetary Society release The Planetary Society's third expedition to Belize is searching for evidence of the asteroid impact that ended the age of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. This time everyone is invited to participate via this web site: http://www.planetary.org/hot- topics/belize/ where field reports--including images--from the expedition will be posted on a daily basis. Team leaders Adriana Ocampo of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Kevin Pope of Geo Eco Research are again leading a group of Planetary Society volunteers on a geological adventure into the jungles of Belize. Past Society expeditions to the region collected samples of ejecta blanket material--debris blasted from the Chicxulub crater when the asteroid crashed just off the coast of the Yucatan. The crater, now buried under the accumulated sediment of millions of years, is 200 to 300 kilometers across (about 124 to 186 miles across). Ocampo said, "In this third expedition to Belize, we will continue our quest to build a more complete picture of what really happened when a comet or asteroid collided with Earth and changed our world forever. "We have been tantalized by unique evidence from the impact found only in Belize, and this expedition will allow us to better understand how impacts affect Earth and the other planets in our solar system." Scientific objectives of the 1998 expedition include collecting samples; following the ejecta blanket from north to south Belize to see how far it extends; and mapping the distribution of ballistically deformed materials, such as "Pook's pebbles"--unique features that were discovered in Belize on a prior Society expedition. This expedition will also work on an analog to Mars by correlating their findings in Belize with similar features found on the martian surface during the Pathfinder mission. A digital camera, donated to the Planetary Society by Epson, will be used to record images of scientists and volunteers at work, the sites being studied, and some of the geological samples discovered. These images, along with daily field reports, will be posted on the Society's web site. Expedition team member Robert Cozzi, well-known author of six books on computer programming, and his daughter Theresa will post the reports and photograph the expedition. Discoveries from the 1995 and 1996 trips to Belize include * The identification of a new species of crab that went extinct at the end of the Cretaceous period, named Carcineretes planetarius in honor of the Planetary Society; * Identification of shock quartz in northern Belize; * Identification of an iridium anomaly at Albion in northern Belize; and * Identification of possible condensate material from the impact's vapor plume, including Pook's pebbles. While this is the Planetary Society's third expedition to Belize, it is the fourth sent by the Society to study evidence of the Chicxulub impact. Another expedition went to Italy in 1996 to study core samples from that same time period. ------------------------------------------------------------------ ANTARCTICA EXPEDITION ONLINE by Jim Bladen The following web site documents Dr. Luann Becker's Antarctica expedition to collect meteorites and Antarctic ice samples: http://govt.us.oracle.com/mars Dr. Becker will analyze the meteorites and ice, and will compare the organic components of each to address the origin (terrestrial or extraterrestrial) of the material. Part of Dr. Beckers' research involves the assessment of organic matter in martian meteorites. An important issue to address in these studies is what organic components are present in the Antarctic environment, and how the Antarctic weathering process affects the preservation of organic matter in meteorites. Dr. Becker is an astrobiologist/geochemist with the University of Hawaii. Astrobiology is the study of life in the universe. This site enables Dr. Becker to collaborate with her peers and Mars enthusiasts worldwide from the field in Antarctica. This web site is sponsored by Oracle Corporation in a cooperative effort to make the findings of this scientific expedition available to interested persons worldwide. JBLADEN@us.oracle.com ------------------------------------------------------------------ MARS GLOBAL SURVEYOR FLIGHT STATUS REPORT JPL release 30 January, 1998 Last week, the flight team celebrated a mission milestone as Surveyor completed its 100th orbit around Mars. Afterward, flight operations manager Joe Beerer characterized aerobraking operations to reduce the size of the orbit as proceeding at a "very satisfying" pace. As of today, Surveyor is completing one revolution around Mars every 19.2 hours. This orbital period is nearly 75 minutes shorter than that predicted for this time prior to the winter holidays. Aerobraking progress continues to be assisted by the relative calm state of the Martian atmosphere despite the continuance of the traditional dust storm season. A stable atmosphere allows the spacecraft to aerobrake at slightly lower altitudes in order to experience more air resistance. This increase in air resistance results in the size of the orbit shrinking at a faster rate. In other news, the flight team has inserted spacecraft rotation commands to the list of tasks executed on every orbit. Normally, Surveyor spends the majority of its time with its high-gain antenna pointed directly at the Earth. The new commands occur twice per orbit and rotate the spacecraft so that different parts are better exposed to the Sun. These rotations are necessary to keep the temperatures on the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter science instrument from falling below its functional limit of 10 degrees Celsius. Current analysis shows that the laser will require these warming rotations until September of this year. After a mission elapsed time of 449 days from launch, Surveyor is 207.12 million miles (333.33 million kilometers) from the Earth and in an orbit around Mars with a high point of 17,260 miles (27,777 km), a low point of 75.2 miles (121.0 km), and a period of 19.2 hours. The spacecraft is currently executing the P112 command sequence, and all systems continue to perform as expected. The next status report will be released on Friday, February 20th. ------------------------------------------------------------------ ADDITIONAL EXPERIMENTS SELECTED FOR MARS 2001 MISSIONS NASA release 98-13 NASA has selected additional instruments for the Mars Surveyor 2001 missions, which will study Mars' environment. The Mars Surveyor 2001 missions will follow two other robotic Mars missions to be launched in late 1998 and early 1999. All are part of NASA's long-term, systematic exploration of Mars in which two missions are launched to the planet approximately every 26 months. "In a sense, these missions allow virtual presence by humans and provide precursor data and subsequent infrastructure for possible human missions in the 21st century," said Arnauld Nicogossian, Associate Administrator of NASA's Office of Life and Microgravity Sciences and Applications. "By adding capability to missions already planned, this near term effort will result in cost effective, tangible progress in carrying out the Human Exploration and Development of Space strategy and contribute to the Origins program of NASA's Office of Space Science." NASA's Office of Life and Microgravity Sciences and Applications has selected the following investigations for the Mars 2001 Orbiter, due for launch in March of that year, and the Mars 2001 Lander/Rover, due for launch in April 2001: * The Martian Radiation Environment Experiment will characterize the radiation environment in the orbit and on the surface of Mars simultaneously. This experiment will consist of radiation spectrometers on both the Mars 2001 Orbiter and on the Mars 2001 Lander. Dr. Guatam Badhwar from NASA's Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX, is the principal investigator. * The Mars Environmental Compatibility Assessment will characterize Martian dust and soil to identify potential undesirable and harmful interactions with human explorers and associated hardware, and to evaluate properties of the soil related to its use as a construction material. Dr. Thomas Meloy from West Virginia State University is the principal investigator. A team consisting of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, CA, and Lockheed Martin Astronautics, Denver, CO, will develop the missions, led by JPL. The radiation and dust investigations were selected from 39 proposals submitted to NASA in August 1997. Both of the 2001 missions are part of an ongoing NASA series of robotic Mars exploration spacecraft that began with the launches of the Mars Global Surveyor in November 1996. The 2001 missions represent the first step in a NASA initiative to integrate the requirements for Space Science and the Human Exploration and Development of Space program into a single robotic exploration program. --------------------------------------------------------------- SYMPOSIUM ON MARS SAMPLE RETURN MISSION AT AAAS MEETING NASA note N98-12 9 February, 1998 What are the benefits of exploring Mars? Is it possible to find signs of life using robotic explorers? What are the risks of bringing a sample of the Red Planet back to Earth? These are among the issues to be discussed by a panel of scientists, including Dr. Wesley T. Huntress, Jr., NASA's Associate Administrator of Space Science, at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Annual Meeting and Science Innovation Exposition in Philadelphia, PA, on Feb. 15, 1998. The panel, called "Mars Sample Return Missions: Scientific, Technical and Social Challenges," will begin at 3 p.m. Panelists are Dr. Huntress; Dr. Klaus Keil, Professor of Planetary Geosciences and Chair, Hawaii Institute of Geophysics and Planetology, University of Hawaii, Manoa; Dr. Rita R. Colwell, President, University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute, College Park, MD; Dr. Jonathan Y. Richmond, Director, Office of Health Safety, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, GA; Dr. Margaret S. Race, SETI Institute, Mountain View, CA; and Dr. John D. Rummel, Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, MA, and NASA. Following the symposium, the panelists will take part in a round- table discussion on the benefits and challenges of Mars sample return and will take questions from the audience. ------------------------------------------------------------------ NASA COMET AND JUPITER MISSIONS OFFER EDUCATOR FELLOWSHIPS JPL release 22 January, 1998 Two NASA space missions are seeking candidates to apply for educator fellowships to help field-test educational modules and to plan and participate in teacher training workshops developed by the projects. NASA's Stardust mission, which will launch in 1999, fly to a comet and collect a sample for return to Earth, is seeking applicants for 10 educator fellowships. As part of a nationwide teacher training initiative, the Stardust project is developing educational modules, targeted at grades 4 through 8, that will be tested by the Stardust Educator Fellows chosen from around the country. In late spring/summer 1998, a second announcement of opportunity will be distributed to solicit candidates from which an additional 15 Stardust Educator Fellows will be selected and trained in fall 1998. Those selected for the educator fellowships will receive an all- expenses-paid intensive training workshop about the comet sample return mission this spring at Lockheed Martin Astronautics in Denver, CO. Fellows will also receive guidance on presentation strategies and a complete teacher training presenter package so they can conduct their own Stardust teacher training workshops. Ideal candidates are actively teaching or conducting teacher training in a formal or informal science environment (school district, science center, museum, educational organization, etc.). Selected candidates will be announced by March 6, 1998. Additional information for Stardust Educator Fellowship applicants is available on the Stardust home page at http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov Candidates are also being sought for the Galileo Europa Mission Educator Fellowship Program for 1998 and 1999. A team of 15 Educator Fellows will be selected for training at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA. Individuals selected will receive a complete workshop package and educational materials to conduct their own teacher training geared toward middle and high school teachers. More information is available at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/ The fellowships will focus on the Galileo Europa Mission, a two- year extension of the Galileo Mission to Jupiter, which will study two of Jupiter's moons with opposite and extreme conditions. Icy Europa may have liquid oceans hidden under its surface, while Io is dotted with volcanoes. Applications for the Galileo Europa Mission Educator Fellowships must be received by February 16, with selected candidates to be announced on February 27. Application information for both Stardust and Galileo Europa Mission programs may be requested by contacting Kerri Beisser, Challenger Center for Space Science Education,1029 N. Royal Street, Suite 300, Alexandria, VA 22314; or by sending a query via fax to (703) 683-7546. Applicants should specify for which program they wish to apply. The Stardust Mission and the Galileo Europa Mission are managed for NASA's Office of Space Science by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA. ------------------------------------------------------------------ CALL FOR ARTICLES FOR NEW COSMOS MAGAZINE by Alex Michael Bonnici In Anticipation of the coming Millennium I have decided to launch a new Magazine in honor of the Late Dr. Carl Sagan concerning humanity's future in the universe. The magazine is entitled "Cosmos: A Magazine Concerning Humanity's Future In The Universe". It will be a web based magazine or e-zine. Larry Klaes will be the editor of this magazine, while I will be providing the web space, and contributing an article or two from time to time. It is my attention to launch this magazine in two months. I am sending out a general call for articles, and would appreciate your participation. The general layout of this magazine can be seen by following this link: http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/8505/CosmosMagazine.html I beforehand thank you for your participation. Mr. Alex Michael Bonnici carlsagan@craigerware.avalon.net ------------------------------------------------------------------ End Marsbugs, Vol. 5, No. 2