Welcome to Penn State Astrobiology Research Center.  The Center is part of the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI).

A major research focus of astrobiology is enabling the recognition of signatures of life on the early Earth, in extreme environments, and in extraterrestrial settings.  Our team will develop novel approaches to detecting and characterizing life, investigate biosignatures in mission-relevant ecosystems and ancient rock and evaluate the potential for biosignatures in extraterrestrial settings.

  • Carbonate structures forming in the Eel River Basin through the anaerobic oxidation of methane.
  • Matthew Fantle sampling gypsum from Grotta Bella in the Frasassi Gorge (Italy). The Ca and S isotope composition of these sasmples are determined as part of PSARC's NAI-funded research program.
  • Science diver and cave explorer Brian Kakuk prepares to collect microbial biofilms in the anoxic waters of a Bahamian blue hole. The samples will be analyzed in the Macalady Lab.
  • Penn State Graduate student near the equator searching for subsurface life.
  • "Fab Five" in the Pilbara, Western Australia. Summer 2009.
  • Expedition team members search for Pleistocene rodent middens associated with volcanic ash layers and ice wedges in the Klondike region, Yukon Territory.
  • Postdoc Sharmishtha Dattagupta collects geochemical data and microbial samples from an underground sulfidic stream.
  • Submersible Alvin after a successful dive to the Eel River Basin methane seeps.
  • Scanning electron micrograph of Chryseobacterium greenlandense sp. nov. isolated from a 120,000-year-old, 3043m deep Greenland glacier ice core sample.
  • B Shapiro and Yukon Paleontologist G Zazula review remains recovered from a placer gold mining operation near Dawson City, Yukon Territory.
  • Brantley lab Research Assistant Laura Liermann Conducting PCR on DNA extracted from Sverfjell volcano samples.
  • Map of the Milky Way Galaxy, our home, with dots showing the location of 280 stars known to host exoplanets. Yellow dots indicate stars with planets that transit (pass in front of) their parent star.
  • View from the ship approaching Svalbard, a Mars analogue field site above the arctic circle.
  • Scanning electron micrograph of Herminiimonas glaciei sp. nov. isolated from a 120,000-year-old, 3043m deep Greenland glacier ice core sample.
  • Diehard isotope geochemists.
  • Matthew Fantle filtering spring and stream waters around Grotta Bella in the Frasassi Gorge (Italy). The Ca isotope composition of these sasmples are determined as part of PSARC's NAI-funded research program.
  • High-pressure water hoses are used to remove melted permafrost in the search for paleontological and paleobotanical evidence of the Late Pleistocene Beringian environment.

PSARC Mission

Developing New Biosignatures

Our efforts will focus on creating innovative approaches for the analyses of cells and other organic material, finding ways in which metal abundances and isotope systems reflect life, and developing creative approaches for using environmental DNA to study present and past life.

Biosignatures in Ancient Rocks

The Earth’s Archean and Proterozoic eons offer the best opportunity for investigating a microbial world, such as might be found elsewhere in the cosmos. The ancient record on Earth provides an opportunity to see what geochemical signatures are produced by microbial life and how these signatures are preserved over geologic time.

Biosignatures in Relevant Microbial Ecosystems

We will investigate microbial life in some of Earth’s most mission-relevant ecosystems: the Dead Sea, the Chesapeake impact structure, the methane seeps of the Eel River Basin, and Greenland glacier ice.

Biosignatures in Extraterrestrial Settings

We will investigate the abundance of sulfur gases and elucidate how these gases can be expected to evolve with time on young terrestrial planets. We will continue studies of planet formation in the presence of migration and model radial transport of volatiles in young planetary systems, and will also be involved with searches for M star planetary companions and planets around K-giant stars.

 

Latest News

Expedition 331

Expedition 331 was to the "deep, hot biosphere" off the coast of Japan in the Okinawa back-arc basin. The main drilling sites were in close proximity to a hydrothermal vent chain because the main goal was to look at the "subvent biosphere". Life in the subsurface around hydrothermal vents has been questionable because past cruises have had trouble isolating indigenous life from possible contamination in the drilling fluid or seawater. One unique aspect of looking for life in the subsurface of hydrothermal vent systems is that there is hydrothermal fluid (containing carbon dioxide, methane, hydrogen, sulfur compounds, ammonia, oxygen, and other organic compounds) which is variable depending on the physical, chemical and/or biological processes that occur in the fluid pathways. So, the scientists are really searching to find what life is present, how life survives near or in hydrothermal conditions, and how they hydrothermal fluid is moving laterally through the subsurface, basically tying it all together.

 

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