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EAI on-line seminar:,MICROORGANISMS IN THE DEEP BIOSPHERE – RELEVANCE FOR THE SEARCH FOR LIFE ON OTHER PLANETS AND MOONS

Jean-Pierre de Vera, German Aerospace Centre

Tuesday, 3 November 2020, 16:00 CET (15:00 UTC)

On Earth life has colonized nearly all continents and oceans from the high altitudes in mountain ranges to the deepest regions of the oceans. Life has also adapted to all climate zones from the polar to the tropic latitudes. But often we forget to take into consideration the subsurface or deep subsurface as potential deep habitats. This lecture will give insights in the definition and nature of a hidden world, the so-called deep Biosphere which extends from the surface-connected subsurface via the shallow subsurface down to the deep subsurface. The total extension could reach several hundred meters to in maximum several kilometers below the surface and the ocean floor. Examples will be given on discoveries of specific habitable environments in the deep subsurface inhabited by specific extremophiles. Also, the resources will be shown which are available to keep such kind of organisms physiologically active in extremely dark, hot, acidic or alkalic and high-pressure areas of our home planet. These findings will have implications for the search for life on other planets and moons such as Mars, the Jovian moon Europa or the Saturnian moon Enceladus.

Streaming link:

You can view the lecture via the following link at Youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPlZtiq19Ws

EAI on-line seminar:  

Julie Noivaková, Charles University Prague; Czech Republic

20 October 2020, 16:00 CEST (14:00 UTC)

From medieval Japanese folk tales to modern science fiction, people have always imagined whether there could be life outside of the Earth. But only recent decades brought us the means to "go where no one has gone before" and test it. How has older and contemporary fiction imagined life on Venus, Mars, Europa or in other star systems entirely, and what can current science say about that?

Author, biologist and educator Julie Nekola Nováková will lead us on this journey through space and time and show the way science fiction can help us understand and communicate science, such as in the e-book anthology Strangest of All, edited for the European Astrobiology Institute.

The seminar can be watched on Youtube here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTjHdr9ND08