“Departing for Cape Town next Saturday (15th) afternoon, arrival in Cape Town late Sunday night the 16th. We have a pre-flight briefing on the 17th or 18th, and are scheduled to depart for the ALCI ice-runway on the morning of the 19th (local CPT time which is UTC+2).”

Keith’s note: NASA funds some really cool stuff – especially in the area of Astrobiology – the search for life elsewhere in the universe. Yet the NASA Astrobiology program has a pitiful record when it comes to getting out news about its own cool stuff. Here is the latest example.

Keith’s note: When “Avatar” first came out in 2009 NASA almost completely ignored it (see “Avatar: A Stunning New World That NASA Continues to Ignore” from 2010 ). Avatar portrayed the wonders of an alien biosphere on an extrasolar planet orbiting tha star in the system closest to Earth. These days you hear people at NASA – starting with the Administrator – talking about Astrobiology – searching for life elsewhere. In the 13 years since its release real science has shown the sheer immensity of possible planets in the universe – and how many of them could be habitable. The sequel, “Avatar: The Way Of Water” will descend upon our world in December. Will NASA Ignore it or embrace it? Its presence will be globally ubiquitous with versions simultaneously released in 160 languages (the Voyager interstellar message record only had 55). For hundreds of millions of young people around the world Avatar may well be their first immersive vision of what adventures await humanity in space. And dreams often shape reality.

SETI Institute: “Frank Drake 1930-2022: So many scientists at the SETI Institute and around the world, were inspired to follow their careers because of Frank Drake. Frank not only left his mark on the fields of Astronomy, Astrophysics and SETI, but he left his mark on all of humankind. He dared to pursue one of the most profound, compelling and inspiring questions in all of science and indeed, all of philosophy. NASA’s third science question: ‘Are We Alone?’ might well have been something else were it not for Frank’s pioneering.”

"Two Ingenuity class helicopters will be used as back-ups to transfer samples to #Mars sample return ascent vehicle – @Dr_ThomasZ #Astrobiology — FYI this redundancy option would not even be possible if @sciastro John Grunsfeld had insisted that Ingenuity be sent to Mars. pic.twitter.com/UOvAcLmFrJ — NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) July 27, 2022

Keith Cowing · NASAWatch/SpaceRef on Alhurra: Life signs on Mars?

Report Identifies Priority Planetary Science Missions, Planetary Defense Efforts, and Strategic Investments for the Next Decade “A new decadal survey [Origins, Worlds, and Life: A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032] from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine identifies scientific priorities and opportunities and makes funding recommendations to maximize the advancement of planetary science, astrobiology, and planetary defense in the next 10 years. The recommendations by […]

NASA ‘looks to the heavens’ for help: Agency enlists 24 theologians to assess how the world would react to the discovery of alien life on distant planets and how it might change our perception of gods and creation, Daily Mail “NASA is looking to the heavens for help with assessing how humans will react if alien life is found on other planets and how the discovery could impact our ideas […]

Organic molecules revealed in Mars’s Bagnold Dunes by Curiosity’s derivatization experiment, Nature Astronomy ” .. No amino-acid derivatives were detected. However, chemically derivatized benzoic acid and ammonia were detected. Mass spectra matching derivatized phosphoric acid and phenol were present, as were several nitrogen-bearing molecules and as yet unidentified high-molecular-weight compounds. … This derivatization experiment on Mars has expanded the inventory of molecules present in Martian samples and demonstrated a powerful […]

Astrobiologist Dale Andersen Antarctic Status Report 29 October 2021: Heading Back To Untersee Oasis “While at Untersee Oasis, we will continue our studies of Lake Untersee and it’s stunningly beautiful and interesting ecosystem. This year we will again be diving beneath its thick, 3.5 m perennial ice-cover to make observations and collect samples to depths of ~30 m.”

Keith’s note: The official Twitter account for NASA SMD’s Astrobiology program @NASAAstrobio posted several tweets earlier today about a Astrobiology paper – and then deleted the tweets. Then they reposted the tweets. Today’s NASA article refers to a NASA-authored paper “Call For A Framework For Reporting Evidence For Life Beyond Earth”. FYI this paper has actually been openly available since 23 July 2021 on on arXiv and is still online. […]

Keith’s note: Bill Nelson was on CNN just before 8:00 pm EDT Sunday night to talk about the UAP/UFO report released by the Pentagon Friday evening. Nelson said “I have seen the unclassified and classified version of the report. It says what we thought. We do not know what the answer is to what those navy pilots saw. I have asked our scientists if there is any kind of explanation. […]

Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena, DNI “The UAP documented in this limited dataset demonstrate an array of aerial behaviors, reinforcing the possibility there are multiple types of UAP requiring different explanations. Our analysis of the data supports the construct that if and when individual UAP incidents are resolved they will fall into one of five potential explanatory categories: airborne clutter, natural atmospheric phenomena, USG or industry developmental programs, foreign adversary […]

Keith’s note: I have asked NASA multiple times over the years what their plan is in the eventuality that life – past or present – is discovered off of our planet. Based on previous NASA announcements such as the ALH84001 Mars meteorite, water on Mars in 2000, etc. NASA has never had a plan and as best I can determine it still has no plan. They just keep their heads […]

Contacting aliens could end all life on earth. Let’s stop trying, Op Ed by Mark Buchanan, Washington Post “More alarming is the possibility that alien civilizations are remaining out of contact because they know something: that sending out signals is catastrophically risky. Our history on Earth has given us many examples of what can happen when civilizations with unequal technology meet — generally, the technologically more advanced has destroyed or […]

NASA is getting serious about UFOs, CNN “We don’t know if it’s extraterrestrial. We don’t know if it’s an enemy. We don’t know if it’s an optical phenomenon,” Nelson said. “We don’t think [it’s an optical phenomenon] because of the characteristics that those Navy jet pilots described … And so the bottom line is, we want to know.” NASA press secretary Jackie McGuinness said Nelson did not establish a formal […]

Keith’s note: Earlier today I posted NASA CIO’s Open Data Thing Is Still Screwed Up. I went back to to the CIO’s data.nasa.gov page to see if their data collection is accessible to the public. I went to the “Technical Report Server” pull down menu and clicked on “Public Search” which sent me to NTRS – NASA Technical Reports Server. I searched for “astrobiology” and the top search result is […]

Volcanoes On Mars Could Be Active, Raise Possibility of Recent Habitable Conditions, PSI “Evidence of recent volcanic activity on Mars shows that eruptions could have taken place within the past 50,000 years, a paper by Planetary Science Institute Research Scientist David Horvath says. … A volcanic deposit such as this also raises the possibility for habitable conditions in the near surface of Mars in recent history, says Horvath. “The interaction […]

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 […]