"Scientists at NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA, collaborating with the Astrophysikalisches Institut in Germany, have demonstrated that organic chemistry is abundant in the universe, implying that carbon-based life could be possible throughout the universe."

Deadline: March 5, 1999

"The Directorates for Biological Sciences (BIO), Engineering (ENG), Geosciences (GEO), Mathematical and Physical Sciences (MPS), and the Office of Polar Programs (OPP) of the National Science Foundation (NSF) announce an opportunity to enhance knowledge about "Life in Extreme Environments" (LExEn) through highly interdisciplinary, integrated research activities. Two new areas of emphasis are added to the fiscal year 1999 competition: a particular focus is placed upon the development of methods and capabilities to facilitate LExEn research. Secondly, a new effort in cooperation with the National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA) is described to begin long term studies over decadal time scales at representative examples of significant extreme environments."

Note: This NRA will solicit proposals for advanced technologies for NASA science missions.

Draft released 11/20/98
Comments due 12/18/98
Final release targeted 2/99

Listen to Space Beat [RealAudio requuired]

This is an Internet radio show produced by students at Purdue university. Listen to what the next generation of potential space researchers thinks of what NASA is doing.

Actually, it only seems as if they are going to collide by virtue of the line of sight position of the camera vis-a-vis the satellite and the meteor.

Check out the QuickTime movie [664K] of video shot from an airplane participating in The Leonid Multi-Instrument Aircraft Campaign (Leonid MAC), an airborne astrobiology mission to observe the Leonid meteors.

"An image of the Deep Space 1 spacecraft acquired by the 5-meter (200-inch) Hale telescope on Palomar Mountain is available online. The image was captured by Jet Propulsion Laboratory astronomers November 16, 1998, when the spacecraft was 3.7 million kilometers (2.3 million miles) from Earth.

Editor's note: Remember the names "Aladdin", "Deep Impact", "INSIDE", "Messenger", and "Vesper". You'll hear much more about them in the years to come.

7:30 - 9:00 PM, National Air and Space Museum, Einstein Planetarium, Washington DC. Admission is free. Seating is limited and is on a first-come, first-serve basis.

Participants:

• Richard Berendzen, American University
• Steven Dick, U.S. Naval Observatory
• Megan Kemble, George Washington University
• Gerald Soffen, NASA GSFC

"The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is heading the experiment, which is the first mission in NASA's Astrobiology Program, created to study the origin and prevalence of life in the universe."

"Are the extraterrestrials out there? Needless to say, researchers at the SETI Institute certainly believe so. Do we wish to find evidence of their existence? Of course. Has someone already done that? We donšt think so."

"Cohen asserts that the 'signal' is a fabricated one or a snip of a terrestrial satellite's signal being passed off as otherwise. ``A hacker gone wild. Too many 'Contact' reruns. Case closed'', said Cohen. "

Editor's Note: Joe Zelibor organized this meeting. I spoke with him at great length by phone (sadly, just a few hours before his accident) about this meeting and his hopes for Astrobiology. He was clearly looking forward to the meeting and was very excited by all the things that were happening (and about to happen) in space. This was the very first time Joe and I had spoken. We both seemed to have enjoyed our conversation and had already made tentative plans for lunch the following week.

Joe died on 16 October of injuries received in a motorcycle accident on his way home from work a week ago. He had been in a coma since the accident.

Based on my far too short aquaintance with Joe I expect he will be greatly missed.

"Mars is a small planet that does things in a very big way,'' John Pearl of Goddard Space Flight Center said at meeting Monday of the planetary division of the American Astronomical Society."

The STS-95 press kit is now online, inaugurating a new service that will enable members of the news media and the public to obtain access to each mission's information earlier and with more detail than ever before. The press kit can be accessed on the World-Wide Web at: www.shuttlepresskit.com. The new online press kit was a collaborative effort between NASA, United Space Alliance and Boeing North American

New images captured by NASA's Galileo spacecraft of lightning on Jupiter, an eclipse and aurora on Jupiter's fiery moon Io, and surface features on two other Jovian moons-Europa and Callisto-will be unveiled Tuesday, October 13, at 8am Pacific time, at the following Internet addresses:

• http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov
• http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo
• http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/sepo

"Officials say that the University of Washington is the first to offer a doctorate in astrobiology, where students compare extreme environments on Earth to those on other planets, such as Mars and Europa, one of Jupiter's moons. The program will begin in the fall semester of 1999, and is funded from a five-year, $2 million National Science Foundation grant, plus $500,000 from the university."

"Graduates will be able to receive degrees in 11 areas, with an emphasis in astrobiology. Students can choose from oceanography, astronomy, aeronautics and astronautics, genetics, chemistry, biochemistry, microbiology, atmospheric sciences, geophysics, geological sciences, or history as their core focus of study. "

"The International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) has selected "Walking to Olympus: An EVA Chronology," written by David S. Portree and Robert C. Trevino and published by NASA, as the winner of the 1998 Luigi Napolitano Book Award. The award will be presented in Melbourne, Australia, on Sept. 27, during the 1998 IAA award dinner. "

Note:Astrobiology Web readers should take the time to visit "Romance to Reality: moon & Mars expedition & settlement plans", an excellent website maintained by David S. F. Portree, one of the authors of "Walking to Olympus".

Note: Our Whole Mars Catalog is listed as a web resouce.

"Astronomers from the National University of Mexico tuned powerful radio telescopes on the double-star system and found to their surprise that each star is encircled by a dense disk of planet-forming dust and gas. The rings contain enough material to form two sets of planets."

Sponsored by the Office of Life and Microgravity Sciences and Applications (OLMSA), the Challenge Project highlights health and learning in the Scott Carpenter Space Analog Station, an ocean-floor habitat, and includes this 7-day Challenge Mission. Webchats and webcasts are available at least twice every day at the Challenge Mission website. You can contact Rosalind Grymes, (650) 604-3239 at NASA ARC, or Jennifer McCarter, 202-358-1639 at NASA HQ, for more information.

Another extremophile - a bacterium which thrives in high-salt conditions - produces a fascinating protein which changes color extremely efficiently. Crystals grown by Spacelab make scientists hopeful that they can understand the biological function and apply it to, for example, artificial retinas for people.

"Battered by meteorites, the early Earth was no place for life to take hold. But our most primitive ancestors could have found refuge on the planet next door, argues Paul Davies"

Editor's Note: The closeups of Phobos are striking. Have a look.

CNN will air video of a group of dedicated Astrobiologists wading through an acidic guano soup in a cave in Mexico wearing full face mask breathers as they search for life in extreme environments - conditions similar to those which may harbor life on other worlds. The footage will be shown on the CNN-Time Newstand program, 10pm Eastern, 9 central, 8 Mountain, and (we understand) 10pm Pacific. It will be repeated on Monday, 3 August.

"The Astrobiology Web - Join the hunt for life beyond the Earth--one of the most exciting projects in science today. The Astrobiology Web contains an almost bewildering amount of information on the topic. Start with "Astrobiology Now!" for the latest news relating to life in the universe. The numerous topics listed toward the bottom of the homepage lead to essays, links and news releases; here you can learn about the possibility of life on Europa or the search for extrasolar planetary systems. "

Note: The Astrobiology Web is a featured web link:

" Astrobiology is the name some NASA officials give to the study of "the origin and distribution of life in the universe." "The Astrobiology Web" is a gold mine, with loads of links, references and breaking news on topics such as life in extreme environments, the origins of life and the like."

"The more websites there are that discuss sending humans to Mars the more voices can be heard. The more voices which are heard, the louder the cry. The louder the cry, the more powerful the call. The more powerful the call, the greater the chance that decision makers will listen.

Get wired. Speak out. Go to Mars."

"New Mars" is the official e-zine of The Mars Society. If you are not already planning to do so, you should seriously consider attending the founding convention of the Mars Society, 13-16 August 1998, at the University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado.

The Astrobiology Web will be there - will you?

New images show Jupiter's giant moon Ganymede has geologic hints of an early subsurface ocean and a chain of 13 craters that could have come from a broken-up comet

"A large meteorite is being blamed for hundreds of sightings of bright lights in the sky along the west coast of Britain on Friday evening."

Fact meets fiction as Hollywood tries to portray asteroid impacts accurately. A movie review of "Deep Impact" written by the editor of the Astrobiology Web is quoted in this article.

Instrumentation Technology Associates, Inc. (ITA) and the American Society for Gravitational and Space Biology (ASGSB) are offering an opportunity for students to fly experiments on STS- 95, in October of 1998. The experiment must be designed to be accommodated by the furnished hardware. The Materials Dispersion Apparatus developed by ITA provides wells in which specimens can be carried into orbit. Additional information on this hardware is found at: http://www.itaspace.com/

ITA and ASGSB are looking for a brief proposal (2-3 pages) which would include background/previous research, a detailed description of the experiment, and the facilities, personnel supporting it. Funding support for this experiment (laboratory facility, man-hours, supplies, travel) must be provided by the investigator. For further details, contact: Tom Dreschel, ASGSB Education Committee Chairman, +1.407.867.2926 email: thomas.dreschel-1@ksc.nasa.gov

Dan Goldin will be speaking about Astrobiology at NASA ARC at 2:30 PM PDT today. Details to follow.

"Astronomers at the U. S. Naval Observatory announced today the first results from a new type of instrument which may soon lead to the discovery of Earth-mass planets orbiting other stars."

"....Meanwhile, NASA's life and microgravity sciences office is keeping its distance from the institute, which is being supported primarily by the agency's space science office. Life sciences spokesperson Michael Braukus confirmed that the office will not contribute funding to the effort--instead, it is preparing its own series of grants in evolutionary biology. "Unfortunately, this is all mired in NASA politics," says one agency manager. NASA sources say Administrator Dan Goldin has instructed life sciences managers to cooperate with the astrobiology effort."

Editor's Note: It seems rather curious that NASA's life science division at OLMSA is still lukewarm (at best) about Astrobiology. This is also troublesome given that Biology is key to much of what OLMSA does. This obstructionist behavior on OLMSA's part is rather curious in light of Dan Goldin's public and rather exuberant support for Origins and Astrobiology - as was noted in my editorial last month.

I wonder how long Dan will allow OLMSA to continue to take this stubborn stance before he rectifies the situation.

A press release will be issued from NASA Headquarters on Tuesday afternoon, 19 May regarding the participants in the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NABI). 11 proposals will be funded by NASA as participants in the NABI. Among the winners are teams led by Harvard, Scripps, JPL/JSC, UCLA, Arizona State, and NASA ARC. All proposals being funded are for U.S. led teams.

A director for the NABI will not be announced at this time. We have heard that an interim director may be appointed until such time as the permanent director can be selected.

"TO THE EDITOR: The American Society for Gravitational and Space Biology (ASGSB) is supportive of the development of "astrobiology". At its 1997 annual meeting in Washington, DC, the ASGSB sponsored the Dick Young Symposium, which was dedicated to the subject area of astrobiology. Additionally, in 1997, the ASGSB added astrobiology as a subject area for submission of unsolicited abstracts and presentations at their Annual Meetings."

The Astrobiology/Origins theme is clearly one which this NASA Administrator, indeed the Vice President of the United States, intends NASA to pursue. It also embodies much of the inevitable, cohesive path which NASA needs to follow if it is to truly explore the living universe. Those who don't join up risk being left in the dust.

With regard to Astrobiology, the ASGSB sits on the cusp of irrelevance right now.

Editor's note: Jim's column will now be a regular feature at ABC.

Editor's note: Dr. Schimmerling took a lot of time to research his response to my 14 April editorial. As such, his response was somewhat voluminous. I therefore present:

Dr. Schimmerling's original email response to my editorial.

My annotated response to Dr. Schimmerling's comments.