The NAI, founded in 1997, is a partnership between NASA, 16 major U.S. teams and five international consortia. NAI's goal is to promote, conduct, and lead integrated multidisciplinary astrobiology research and to train a new generation of astrobiology researchers.
"We started this as an experiment. Now, five years later, astrobiology is an established field, said Michael Meyer, astrobiology senior scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C.
"Top research groups want to become members of the NAI, and the Institute is attracting the best researchers on planet Earth. The Institute represents the focus point for addressing NASA's mission statement that includes finding life elsewhere," Meyer told SPACE.com.
"This is an ongoing experiment in collaboration across disciplines and distance," Meyer said.
With this group of 16 teams, NAI's efforts reach from the Earth's deep subsurface to the stars, said Rosalind Grymes, acting director of the NAI. "We look to the near-term future of solar system exploration as well as to the distant past of planet Earth," she said in a NASA statement.
The NAI is anchored at NASA's Ames Research Center in California's Silicon Valley. NASA Ames is the space agency's lead center for astrobiology. NAI team awards are for five years, with annual reviews, at an average annual funding level of one million dollars.
Research topics
NASA has given the go-ahead to study groups to examine everything from what makes for a habitable world to water as the elixir of life, as well as identifying the vital ingredients for life.
Following a heated competition, the newly picked team lead institutions, principal investigators and the titles of their proposed research are the following:
- Carnegie Institution of Washington: Sean Solomon, "Astrobiological Pathways: From the Interstellar Medium, Through Planetary Systems, to the Emergence and Detection of Life"
- Indiana University, Bloomington, Ind.: Lisa Pratt, "Indiana-Princeton-Tennessee Astrobiology Institute:
- Detection of Biosustainable Energy and Nutrient Cycling in the Deep Subsurface of Earth and Mars"
- Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, Mass.: Mitchell Sogin, "From Early Biospheric Metabolisms to the Evolution of Complex Systems"
- SETI Institute, Mountain View, Calif.: Christopher Chyba, "Planetary Biology, Evolution and Intelligence"
- NASA Ames Research Center: David DesMarais, "Linking Our Origins to Our Future"
- NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.: Michael Mumma, "Origin and Evolution of Organics in Planetary Systems"
- Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pa.: Hiroshi Ohmoto, "Evolution of a Habitable Planet"
- University of Arizona, Tucson: Neville Woolf, "An Astronomical Search for the Essential Ingredients for Life: Placing our Habitable System in Context"
- University of California at Los Angeles: Edward Young, "From Stars to Genes: An Integrated Study of the Prospects for Life in the Cosmos"
- University of California at Berkeley: Jillian Banfield, "BIOspheres of Mars: Ancient and Recent Studies"
- University of Colorado, Boulder, Colo.: Bruce Jakosky, "University of Colorado Center for Astrobiology"
- University of Hawaii, Manoa: Karen Meech, "The Origin, History, and Distribution of Water and its Relation to Life in the Universe"
SETI: next generation search
The SETI Institute of Mountain View, California was one of the twelve teams that were selected - a long-time leader in the detection of life's bio-signatures. They will be probing global-scale processes that have shaped, and been shaped by, the interaction between life and its environment.
Some of the funded research will help SETI Institute scientists choose the target stars for the SETI Institute's next-generation search for signs of intelligent extraterrestrial life.
Joining the NASA Astrobiology Institute is the culmination of nineteen years of building a multi-disciplinary institution focused on the various sciences that comprise astrobiology, said SETI Institute Chief Executive Officer, Thomas Pierson. "All of us at the SETI Institute look forward to this new level of partnership with NASA and the other NAI team members," said SETI Institute Chief Executive Officer, Thomas Pierson.
Areas of research covered by the SETI Institute's NAI proposal include: high-altitude terrestrial lakes as analogs to early Mars; the habitability of planets orbiting cool M stars, which may enlarge the list of stars targeted for SETI searches; and the surface geology and ocean chemistry of Jupiter's moon Europa, and the survivability of bio-markers on its surface.
Putting the "astro" in astrobiology
The new NAI-funded research also bolsters the "astro" part of the astrobiology program.
The University of Arizona and National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO) in Tucson will bring top scientists and world-class telescope facilities to the NASA-funded search for life on other planets. NOAO operates the Kitt Peak National Observatory.
"The search for the origin of life, and the related question of how often life occurs in our galaxy and the universe are potentially the most interesting and challenging topics in all of 21st century science," said University of Arizona astronomy professor, Nick Woolf, who leads the new Tucson-based NAI work.
Stephen Strom, associate director for science at NOAO, said a top scientific target is studying youthful solar systems.
"By observing the circumstellar disks of gas and dust from which planets form, especially around stars similar to a young sun, we expect to learn when in a star's life that planets can form, and how changes in the young sun's energy output might influence the evolution of life on Earth-like planets elsewhere," Strom said.
Dig deep
You've got to dig deep to learn more about the Universe at large.
The new NAI lead team based at Indiana University in Bloomington is ready to demonstrate to what depths researchers must go to better grasp life beyond Earth.
Their project will employ a series of field and laboratory experiments as well as biological samples taken from deep inside mines to figure out the best of way of detecting life on the Earth, as well as Mars. As yet, no life has been substantiated on or under the surface of Earth's chilly neighbor, Mars, where the daily temperature usually tops out around 30 degrees Fahrenheit.
Similarly, the University of Hawaii is looking at Earth habitats to acquire some "distance learning" about environments on other worlds.
NAI's University of Hawaii (UH) team is set to explore aquatic habitats for life in extreme environments in and around the Hawaiian Islands and will develop instruments that may one day be used to search for life elsewhere in the solar system.
"This is an exciting opportunity for UH scientists who have been studying various aspects of astrobiology to integrate our research into a broader understandings of our origins", said Karen Meech, principal investigator and UH astronomy researcher.
"We are all tremendously excited by this opportunity," Meech said.
For more information about the NAI on the Internet, visit:
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