Astrobiology is a new name for a range of interdiciplinary studies related to life in the universe. The term is defined in the 1996 NASA Strategic Plan as "The Study of the living universe. This field provides a scientific foundation for a multidisciplinary study of (1) the origin and distribution of life in the universe, (2) an understanding of the role of gravity in living systems, and (3) the study of the Earth's atmosphere and ecosystems."

Concepts associated with life in the universe have a long and checkered history in science. Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake in part for his speculation concerning other inhabited worlds, a fate unlikely to be associated today with astrobiology. By the late nineteenth century the pendulum of public thinking had swung to the opposite extreme, with a widespread belief (supported by Percival Lowell and other astronomers) in the presence of intelligent life on Mars. If we can judge by the science fiction of the time, our great-grandparents also believed that humans could survive travel in space and explore other worlds like the Moon with relative impunity. By the mid-twentieth century, however, these optimistic ideas had been largely abandoned. Scientists may have been disappointed by the negative results of the Viking life-detection experiments on Mars, but they were not really surprised. And when NASA first began to consider human space flight, it was felt necessary to send chimpanzees into space first to verify survivability in the space environment, even for flights of only 15-minute duration.

Today the pendulum is swinging back. We have analyzed complex organic chemistry in interstellar clouds of gas and dust and have discovered other planets circling distant stars. On Earth, life has been found at environmental extremes from the Antarctic ice to boiling hot springs, and from thermal vents in the deep ocean to aquifers buried kilometers below the land surface. We know that liquid water, the one essential ingredient for life as we know it, once flowed on the surface of Mars and probably exists today below the icy crust of Europa. Life on Earth has been traced back 3.8 billion years to the period of heavy cometary bombardment, an era that simultaneously brought life-giving water and organic compounds to the terrestrial planets while battering them with lethal quantities of impact energy. We are discovering both the fragility and the robustness of life, as we investigate the history of mass extinctions on our planet (including the extinction taking place today), the subtle alterations in climate triggered by both volcanic eruptions and human industry, and the destruction of our protective shield of ozone by non-toxic, chemically inert, and cheap industrial chemicals. As more and more humans venture into space, we celebrate their ability to live and work and achieve wonderful feats of engineering in this hostile environment, at the same time facing baffling physiological and chemical changes experienced by astronauts on long-duration missions. Space and life interact on many levels and timescales, in ways that we are only beginning to explore.

Astrobiology is playing an increasing role in a wide variety of NASA programs. The primary objectives of the Earth Observing System are related to the effects of human activity on the climate, atmosphere, and ecosphere of our planet. We are building the international space station in part to learn how humans can live and work for long periods in space. The centrifuge facility being constructed for the space station will provide a unique facility for basic science related to the effects of microgravity on living things. We have located 3.6-billion-year-old evidence in a martian meteorite that suggests a warm wet climate on Mars and hints of biological activity. We are planning a series of a dozen spacecraft to Mars, including sophisticated surface rovers and sample return, much of this work motivated by the search for ancient life on that planet. We are accelerating the search for other planets, focused eventually on the discovery of a "pale blue dot," an inhabited planet in some distant solar system. Generous private donations are supporting the most comprehensive search ever undertaken for radio signals from intelligent life in the Galaxy. Life in the cosmos strikes a resonant chord with the public and the science community alike.

We are here today for the world's first scientific conference on astrobiology, to help define this field and to develop new cross-disciplinary programs for the study of life in the universe. The meeting has been organized around five key questions that illustrate the breadth of this subject:

• How does life originate?

• Where and how are other habitable worlds formed?

• How have the Earth and its biosphere influenced each other over time?

• Can terrestrial life be sustained beyond our planet?

• How can we expand human presence to Mars?

This is just one of many ways of looking at astrobiology. Many studies can be included under this umbrella. Most of these are not new. What may be new is the emphasis we are trying to bring to the interdisciplinary aspects of these studies. We seek to bring life scientists and physical scientist together, to help break down the barriers that exist between academic disciplines. If we can talk to each other, we are bound to gain insight and generate new ways of looking at old problems. That is the primary purpose of this astrobiology workshop.

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Last updated Feb-11-1997

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