astrobiology – Page 2 – Astronomy Now

One of NASA’s cleanest spacecraft ever is ready to fly

24 August 2016 Stephen Clark

Five years after winning $1 billion from NASA to mount the first U.S. asteroid sample return mission, scientists and engineers will get their last look at the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft this week as it is closed up inside the nose cone of an Atlas 5 rocket for launch in September.

Habitable planets may lie outside the “Goldilocks zone” in extra-solar systems

5 July 2016 Astronomy Now

If conditions had been just a little different an eon ago, there might be plentiful life on Venus and none on Earth, according to a new hypothesis. Minor evolutionary changes could have altered the fates of both Earth and Venus in ways that scientists may soon be able to model through observation of other solar systems, particularly ones in the process of forming.

Could globular clusters be home to intelligent life?

6 January 2016 Keith Cooper

Globular clusters may be the perfect location to find extraterrestrial civilisations, according to new research announced at the 227th American Astronomical Society meeting in Florida.

Cassini images just a taste of Enceladus flyby science return

31 October 2015 Stephen Clark

Days after a fleeting plunge through the icy plumes of Saturn’s moon Enceladus, NASA’s Cassini spacecraft is broadcasting tantalizing data back to Earth for scientists eager to address the moon’s prospects for life.

Habitable exomoons will need to be bigger than Mars

1 June 2015 Keith Cooper

Planet-sized moons orbiting huge gas giants could provide havens for life around other stars, but in order to be habitable these moons would need to be larger and more massive than Mars.

Geochemical process on Saturn’s moon Enceladus linked to life’s origin

7 May 2015 Astronomy Now

Researchers have revealed the pH of water spewing from geyser-like plumes on Saturn’s moon Enceladus. Their findings are an important step toward determining whether life could exist, or could have previously existed, on the sixth planet’s sixth-largest moon.

Diverse destinations considered for new interplanetary probe

12 April 2015 Stephen Clark

Science teams from across the United States have submitted 28 proposals for missions to explore the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, touch the asteroid-like satellites orbiting Mars, visit unseen worlds and hunt for objects that could strike Earth one day.

Curiosity’s Martian nitrogen find raises possibility of ancient life

31 March 2015 Kerry Hebden

Nitrogen, in the form of nitric oxide (one nitrogen atom and one oxygen atom), has been detected for the first time on the surface of Mars by a team of researchers using the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument suite aboard NASA’s Curiosity rover, adding to the growing speculation that life could have once flourished on ancient Mars.