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Marsbugs: The Electronic Astrobiology Newsletter, Volume 12, Number 1, 14 January 2005
Marsbugs: The Electronic Astrobiology Newsletter
Volume 12, Number 1, 14 January 2005
Editor/Publisher: David J. Thomas, Ph.D., Science Division, LyonCollege, Batesville, Arkansas72503-2317, USA.
Marsbugs is published on a weekly to monthly basis as warranted by the number of articles and announcements. Copyright of this compilation exists with the editor, but individual author(s) retain the copyright of specific articles. Opinions expressed in this newsletter are those of the authors, and are not necessarily endorsed by the editor or by LyonCollege. E-mail subscriptions are free, and may be obtained by contacting the editor. Information concerning the scope of this newsletter, subscription formats and availability of back-issues is available at The editor does not condone "spamming" of subscribers. Readers would appreciate it if others would not send unsolicited e-mail using the Marsbugs mailing lists. Persons who have information that may be of interest to subscribers of Marsbugs should send that information to the editor.
Right: This is one of the first raw, or unprocessed, images from the European Space Agency's Huygens probe as it descended to Saturn's moon Titan. It was taken with the Descent Imager/Spectral Radiometer, one of two NASA instruments on the probe. The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Cassini-Huygens mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, DC. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The Descent Imager/Spectral team is based at the University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ. Image credit: ESA/NASA/University of Arizona.
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Marsbugs: The Electronic Astrobiology Newsletter, Volume 12, Number 1, 14 January 2005
Articles and News
Page 2TOP TEN ASTROBIOLOGY STORIES OF 2004, NUMBER 6: PLANETOIDS BEYOND PLUTO
From Astrobiology Magazine
Page 2THE NEW AND IMPROVED SETI
By Seth Shostak
Page 2PARACHUTING TO TITAN
By Tony Phillips
Page 3TOP TEN ASTROBIOLOGY STORIES OF 2004, NUMBER 5: CATCHING A COMET
From Astrobiology Magazine
Page 4TOP TEN ASTROBIOLOGY STORIES OF 2004, NUMBER 4: SPIRIT ON THE LAKE
From Astrobiology Magazine
Page 4OUR COSMIC PATCH (INTERVIEW WITH SIR MARTIN REES, PART 1)
By Helen Matsos
Page 6TOP TEN ASTROBIOLOGY STORIES OF 2004, NUMBER 3: NEW WORLDS, LIVING LARGE
From Astrobiology Magazine
Page 6NOT SO NEBULOUS—MAGNETICS OF PLANET FORMATION
Based on an Astronomy and Astrophysics report
Page 7QUEEN'S DISCOVERY SHEDS NEW LIGHT ON ANCIENT TEMPERATURES
Queen's University release
Page 8MARS SCIENCE LABORATORY: NEXT WHEELS ON MARS
By Leonard David
Page 8BEFORE THE BEGINNING (INTERVIEW WITH SIR MARTIN REES, PART 2)
By Helen Matsos
Page 9FINDING OTHER WORLDS
By Edna DeVore
Page 9TOP TEN ASTROBIOLOGY STORIES OF 2004, NUMBER 2: CLASH OF THE TITANS
From Astrobiology Magazine
Page 9LISTENING FOR ET: TWO DECADES
By David Pescovitz
Page 10TOP TEN ASTROBIOLOGY STORIES OF 2004, NUMBER 1: OPPORTUNITY KNOCKS
From Astrobiology Magazine
Page 10POOR MAN'S SPACE PROBE—ASTRONOMY THROUGH A MICROSCOPE
By G. Turner
Page 11HUBBLE'S INFRARED EYES HOME IN ON SUSPECTED EXTRASOLAR PLANET
Space Telescope Science Institute release 2005-03
Page 12OUR COSMIC SELF-ESTEEM (INTERVIEW WITH SIR MARTIN REES, PART 3)
By Helen Matsos
Page 13SCIENTISTS DISCOVER UNIQUE MICROBE IN CALIFORNIA'S LARGEST LAKE
University of Oregon release
Page 15ET VISITORS: SCIENTISTS SEE HIGH LIKELIHOOD
By Leonard David
Announcements
Page 15CALL FOR MANUSCRIPTS, 2ND EARLY MARS CONFERENCE SPECIAL SECTION OF JGR-PLANETS.
Journal of Geophysical Research release
Page 15ESA/ISGP JOINT LIFE SCIENCE MEETING 2005
From the NAI Newsletter
Page 16CALL FOR APPLICATIONS FOR ASM UNDERGRADUATE AND MICROBIOLOGY UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH FELLOWSHIPS
By Larry Aaronson and Doretha Foushee
Page 16NASA FREE COMPUTER MODEL AVAILABLE TO CLASSROOMS
NASA release 05-018
Mission Reports
Page 16CASSINI-HUYGENS UPDATES
NASA/ESA releases
Page 21DEEP IMPACT UPDATES
NASA/JPL releases
Page 22NASA ROVERS' ADVENTURES ON MARS CONTINUE
NASA/JPL release 2005-001
Page 24MARS GLOBAL SURVEYOR IMAGES
NASA/JPL/MSSS releases
Page 24MARS ODYSSEY THEMIS IMAGES
NASA/JPL/ASU releases
Page 24MARS RECONNAISSANCE ORBITER MISSION STATUS
NASA/JPL release 2005-006
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Marsbugs: The Electronic Astrobiology Newsletter, Volume 12, Number 1, 14 January 2005
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Marsbugs: The Electronic Astrobiology Newsletter, Volume 12, Number 1, 14 January 2005
TOP TEN ASTROBIOLOGY STORIES OF 2004, NUMBER 6: PLANETOIDS BEYOND PLUTO
From Astrobiology Magazine
30 December 2004
The editors of Astrobiology Magazine revisit the highlights of the year and where possible point to one of the strongest lineups ever for beginning a new turn of the calendar. Between the marathon still being run by the twin Mars rovers and the expected descent to Saturn's moon, Titan, next year promises no letdowns.
Number six on the countdown of 2004 highlights was detection of planetoids beyond Pluto. In December, David Jewitt (University of Hawaii) and Jane Luu (MIT Lincoln Lab) presented the first high quality spectrum of a bright Kuiper Belt Object (50000) Quaoar beyond Pluto. What they found was the signature of potential volcanic heating, since the ice spectrum showed signs of a crystallizing and not amorphous process at work on the icy planetoid. The surface temperature of Quaoar is only 50K (-220°C) and, at these low temperatures, the thermodynamically preferred form of ice is amorphous (meaning "structureless": the water molecules freeze where they stick in a jumbled pattern). The data show that the ice on Quaoar has at some time been raised in temperature above 110K, the critical temperature for transformation from amorphous to crystalline.
This artist's rendition shows "Quaoar" in relation to other bodies in the solar system, including Earth and its Moon; Pluto; and Sedna, a planetoid beyond Pluto that is the largest known object beyond Pluto. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech.
Two ways to heat the ice are 1) to form it at temperatures above 110K, presumably beneath the frigid surface, and then somehow expose it to view from Earth. Warm ice could be excavated by impact from deeper layers, or blown onto the surface by low-level cryovolcanic outgassing through vents. 2) Ice on the surface could be heated above 110K by micrometeorite impact. The timescale for this "back-conversion" of crystalline to amorphous ice is uncertain but probably on the order of 10 Myr for the surface ice. 10 Myr is effectively "yesterday" compared to the 4500 Myr age of the solar system. This means that whatever process emplaces the crystalline ice (basically either impact gardening or cryovolcanic outgassing) has been active in the immediate past and, indeed, is probably still active. While the interpretation remains speculative, the good news is that the researchers are, for the first time, able to take useful spectra that reveal unexpected and intriguing properties of the surface of distant Quaoar.
Quaoar's "icy dwarf" cousin, Pluto, was discovered in 1930 in the course of a 15-year search for trans-Neptunian planets. It wasn't realized until much later that Pluto actually was the largest of the known Kuiper belt objects. The Kuiper belt wasn't theorized until 1950, after comet orbits provided telltale evidence of a vast nesting ground for comets just beyond Neptune. The first recognized Kuiper belt objects were not discovered until the early 1990s.
This hard-to-pronounce planetoid was named after a creation god of the Tongva native American tribe, the original inhabitants of the Los Angeles basin. According to legend, Quaoar, "came down from heaven; and, after reducing chaos to order, laid out the world on the back of seven giants. He then created the lower animals, and then mankind."
Read the original article at
THE NEW AND IMPROVED SETI
By Seth Shostak
From Space.com
30 December 2004
It's an easy question: a query that the media frequently pose, and for obvious reasons. Of course, it would be nice to say, "well, we detected three Type II civilizations last week, but they weren't especially interesting," and sometimes I do this for effect. But of course it's not true, and until it is, some people assume that there's nothing new with SETI.
Wrong. Despite all the difficulties that beset it (mostly connected with funding), SETI is currently experiencing a paroxysm of creative ferment. The new year is sure to be memorable, as glossy new instruments come on-line. Success in SETI depends on speed: how quickly can you check out large expanses of celestial acreage? Well, SETI is about to seriously crank up its speed, and metaphorically trade in chariots for jets.
Read the full article at
PARACHUTING TO TITAN
By Tony Phillips
From NASA Science News
30 December 2004
Get ready for two of the strangest hours in the history of space exploration. Two hours. That's how long it will take the European Space Agency's Huygens probe to parachute to the surface of Titan on January 14th. Descending through thick orange clouds, Huygens will taste Titan's atmosphere, measure its wind and rain, listen for alien sounds and, when the clouds part, start taking pictures.
No one knows what the photos will reveal. Icy mountains? Liquid methane seas? Hot lightning? "It's anyone's guess," says Jonathan Lunine, a professor of planetary science at the University of Arizona and a member of the Huygens science team. "We might not even understand what we see, not immediately." Such is Titan—the biggest mystery in the solar system.
Astronomers have been watching Titan, Saturn's largest moon, for centuries. From Earth it looks like a pinprick of light orbiting the ringed planet—nothing extraordinary. But when NASA's Voyager spacecraft flew by Titan in 1980, observers realized it was something special. Titan is huge: bigger than the planets Mercury and Pluto. It has a huge atmosphere, too: three times taller than Earth's and one and a half times as massive. The air on Titan is choked with organic compounds akin to smog. Some of these molecules are building blocks of life. Could life begin on a world where the surface temperature dips 290°F below zero? "Probably not," says Lunine, but, again, no one knows.
Titan's orange clouds hide its surface and, maybe, some pretty bizarre things. There's methane (CH4) in Titan's atmosphere. Here on Earth methane comes from, e.g., cows and bogs. On Titan, no one knows where it comes from. Because Titan is so cold, its methane can liquefy and rain down from the skies possibly filling lakes and seas on the ground. Liquid methane has about the same appearance and viscosity as ordinary water, but it's some 300°F colder. Lakes on Titan, if they exist, might look like lakes on Earth, but they certainly won't be the same.
Artist Craig Attebery's concept of Huygens' descent. Image credit: ESA/NASA.
This false-color view of Titan is a composite of images captured by Cassini's infrared camera, which can penetrate some of Titan's clouds. Light and dark regions in the upper left quadrant are unknown types of terrain on Titan's surface. Image credit: NASA.
The Huygens probe, about the size of a small car and shaped like a flying saucer, will penetrate the clouds and investigate first hand. "We're so hopeful that Huygens will succeed," says Alfred McEwen, a colleague of Lunine's at the University of Arizona and a member of the Cassini imaging team. "We're pulling our hair out trying to understand Titan."
Huygens rode to Saturn onboard NASA's Cassini spacecraft. The trip lasted 7 years. Cassini arrived in July 2004 and is now orbiting Saturn. Huygens remained onboard until December 25th when it separated from its mother ship and headed for Titan. The probe is scheduled to enter Titan's atmosphere at 10:13 GMT (5:13 AM EST) on January 14, 2005.
On the way down, Huygens will collect air samples for analysis by onboard gas chromatographs and mass spectrometers. This will tell researchers exactly what Titan's atmosphere is made of. Huygens' external sensors will measure temperature, pressure, winds and electromagnetic fields that might come from lightning. Lightning is important. Seething-hot strokes can fuse simple organic molecules into more complicated and interesting things. Some scientists think this is how life began on Earth billions of years ago. A microphone onboard Huygens will listen for thunder (a sign of lightning) and other sounds. For the first time, we'll get to hear what another world sounds like.
Huygens is going to descend during daylight hours. Sunlight filtering through the clouds probably casts an orange glow across the landscape "like 1000 full moons," says McEwen. That's bright enough to read a newspaper, but still about 1000 times dimmer than a sunlit day on Earth. Just before Huygens lands it will turn on an intense flashlight and shine it on the terrain below. This is done to improve pictures of the landing site and help the probe's spectrometers get better readings of elements and minerals in the soil—or whatever's down there.
An artists' concept of Huygens floating in a liquid methane sea. Image credit: ESA/Open University.
"We don't know what we're going to land on," notes Lunine. Huygens might go tumbling down a cliff. It might splash into a lake or sea (Huygens is designed to float). Or it might thump down on a smooth icy plain. "Just about anything is possible."
If the probe survives touchdown, the Surface Science Package attached the bottom of the saucer can measure the properties of the landing site: thermal and electrical conductivity, index of refraction, sonar depth and many other things. Mission planners hope Huygens survives on the "ground" for at least 30 minutes before Titan's bitter cold and unknown hazards shut it down. Even a few minutes of data would be cause for celebration.
While all this is happening, the Cassini spacecraft will be flying overhead, recording Huygens' transmissions. Later, Cassini will turn toward home and relay the pictures and sounds and priceless measurements. Radio signals from Saturn take 1 hour and 8 minutes to reach Earth. "We can't wait to get the data," says McEwen. What's down there? No one knows, but it's bound to be strange. Get ready.
Read the original article at
An additional article on this subject is available at
TOP TEN ASTROBIOLOGY STORIES OF 2004, NUMBER 5: CATCHING A COMET
From Astrobiology Magazine
31 December 2004
Comets may have played a major role in the origin of life on Earth, delivering a significant share of the Earth's water as well as carbon-rich organic compounds. When the Stardust spacecraft passed within 236 kilometers (147 miles) of the comet Wild 2 on January 2, 2004, it encountered a storm of dust particles traveling at over 6 times the speed of a bullet. The spacecraft collected some of the hundreds of thousands of particles that impacted each second, and this sample will be returned to Earth in January 2006.
Left: Comet Wild 2 imaged just after flyby. The image highlights the remarkably rugged surface of the comet, which in close-up stereo views shows hardened impact craters, cliffs, and mesas in the landscape. Image credit: NASA/JPL. Right: Comet Halley imaged by European flyby. Image credit: ESA.
The Stardust spacecraft. Image credit: NASA/JPL.
When Stardust's Sample Return capsule containing the comet particles arrives on Earth in 2006, it will be sent to NASA's JohnsonSpaceCenter in Houston for analysis. Because comets are composed of ice, dust, and gas—the building blocks of the solar system—particles collected from a comet may be able to tell us something about how the solar system formed.
There are two more comet missions currently planned. NASA's Deep Impact mission will visit the comet Tempel 1 on July 4, 2005. The European Space Agency's Rosetta mission launched in March of 2004 and will reach the comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko in November 2014.
Read the original article at
TOP TEN ASTROBIOLOGY STORIES OF 2004, NUMBER 4: SPIRIT ON THE LAKE
From Astrobiology Magazine
2 January 2005
One of the primary goals of the rover missions was to learn once and for all if liquid water ever existed on the red planet. Of the twin rovers, the Opportunity rover has found clues to briny lakes or even a sea on the opposite side of Mars compared to where the Spirit rover currently sits perched near a summit. The Spirit rover was the first successful lander to touchdown since 1997, when the Pathfinder mission began exploring Mars on wheels. Spirit holds the distance record for miles covered since landing in Gusev Crater and beginning its tour of the Columbia Hills.
"With Spirit, the immediate plan is to continue to work our way up through the Columbia Hills," said principal investigator, Steve Squyres of Cornell. "We're very much in discovery mode in that mission. With the Opportunity rover in Eagle crater, in our first six to eight weeks, we were in discovery mode, where every day there was some new revelation about the rocks. And that helped us to form a set of hypotheses that we could use at Endurance crater to systematically test."
"Where we are with Spirit right now is sort of like where we were with Opportunity at Eagle crater," continued Squyres. "We had all that basalt out on the plains, and Spirit did its thing there, and it took us about 160 sols just to get to the Columbia Hills. But since arriving there each new rock, each new outcrop, is some new piece of the puzzle."