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Astrobiology

NASA's Astrobiology Program Continues To Neglect Itself

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
May 6, 2021
Filed under
NASA's Astrobiology Program Continues To Neglect Itself

NASA Seeks Partners for the Astrobiology Science Conference, NASA
“The Astrobiology Science Conference (AbSciCon) is a community-organized conference that provides a forum for reporting on new discoveries, sharing data and insights, advancing collaborative efforts and initiating new ones, planning new projects, and educating the next generation of astrobiologists.”
Keith’s note:NASA made an important Astrobiology program announcement yesterday about an opportunity for external organizations and companies to partner with NASA on upcoming Astrobiology Science Conferences (AbSciCon). You would think that the Science Mission Directorate, Its Planetary Science Division, and the Astrobiology Program would want the widest possible distribution to the Astrobiology community. SMD did send out an email. But wouldn’t you think that the Astrobiology program itself would use its own mailing list, its Twitter account @NASAAstrobio (with 779,000 followers!) and its home page to further promote this opportunity. Guess again.
It has been 24 hours but nothing has been mentioned by the NASA Astrobiology program. Update: they added it to their home page – but 26 hours after the notice was issued by NASA.. And there is no mention on the AbSciCon 2020 home page itself. There is nothing on the NASA Science home page either. Of course the SMD page does not even mention “Astrobiology” which is odd given that NASA refers to the $1 billion+ “mobile astrobiologist” that it has on Mars (Perseverance). President Biden and Vice President Harris mention this rover a lot. You’d think that NASA would pull out all the stops to make sure that its mission and underlying rationale were at the top of their PR to do list.
By contrast Astrobiology.com had the notice posted and tweeted via @Astrobiology within minutes. It is as if no one at SMD cares about Astrobiology any more – starting with the management of the Astrobiology program itself. If they don’t care then why should anyone else?
As you can see from these posts in just the past several years, NASA’s Astrobiology Program neglects itself.
NASA Tries To Explain Its Astrobiology Shyness, earlier post
NASA’s Astrobiology Program Works Hard To Ignore Itself, earlier post
NASA Leads In Astrobiology. It Needs To Act That Way., earlier post
NASA Can’t Figure Out What Astrobiology Is – Or Who Does It, earlier post
Getting Serious About Astrobiology, earlier post
More NASA Astrobiology News That Ignores NASA’s Astrobiology Program, earlier post
NASA’s Science Mission Directorate Has An Issue With Certain Words, earlier post
NASA’s Big Astrobiology Mission To Europa Makes No Mention Of Astrobiology, earlier post
NASA Makes Big Astrobiology Mission Announcement Without Saying “Astrobiology”, earlier post
NASA Leads The World In Astrobiology. Wow, Who Knew?, earlier post
3 New Life Forms Discovered On The Space Station. NASA Yawns In Response., earlier post
Sadly NASA Forgets Its Most Amazing Missions, earlier post
That Time NASAWatch Scooped The Water On Mars Story, earlier post
This Is Not The Planetary Protection Headline That NASA Needs Right Now (Update), earlier post

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.