The first scoop of soil analyzed by the analytical suite in the belly of NASA’s Curiosity rover reveals that fine materials on the surface of the planet contain several percent water by weight. The results were published today in Science as one article in a five-paper special section on the Curiosity mission. The Sample Analysis at Mars [continue reading]
Algae-like structures inside a Sri Lankan meteorite are clear evidence of panspermia, the idea that life exists throughout the Universe, say astrobiologists. A piece of the Sri Lankan meteorite, called the Polonnaruwa Meteorite, that crashed Dec. 29, 2012 near the village of Polonnaruwa (Sri Lanka). Image Credit: Chandra Wickramasinghe – Director Buckingham Astrobiology Center at Buckingham University, [continue reading]
A NASA spacecraft studying Mercury has provided compelling support for the long-held hypothesis the planet harbors abundant water ice and other frozen volatiles within its permanently shadowed polar craters. Mercury’s North Polar Region Acquired By The Arecibo Observatory. Image Credit: National Astronomy and Ionosphere Center, Arecibo Observatory The new information comes from NASA’s MErcury [continue reading]
The hunt for the organic molecules that create proteins and enzymes critical for life here on Earth has largely happened in sophisticated terrestrial laboratories equipped with high-tech gadgetry needed to tease out their presence in space rocks and other extraterrestrial samples. This is an example of chirality of amino acids, using hands to illustrate [continue reading]
NASA’s car-sized rover, Curiosity, has taken significant steps toward understanding how Mars may have lost much of its original atmosphere. If the atmosphere of Mars contains methane, various possibilities have been proposed for where the methane could come from and how it could disappear. Potential non-biological sources for methane on Mars include comets, degradation [continue reading]
Solar systems with life-bearing planets may be rare if they are dependent on the presence of asteroid belts of just the right mass, according to a study by Rebecca Martin, a NASA Sagan Fellow from the University of Colorado in Boulder, and astronomer Mario Livio of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Md. [continue reading]