THE NEWSLETTER OF
ISSOL
THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR THE STUDY OF
THE ORIGIN OF LIFE

David Deamer, Editor
Jason Dworkin, Associate Editor and web site design

THE ISSOL NEWSLETTER

THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR THE STUDY OF THE ORIGIN OF LIFE

David Deamer, Editor

Jason Dworkin, Associate Editor and web site design

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A few words from the Editor

November, 2002
Dear ISSOLians,

As I began to work on the Fall ISSOL Newsletter, it became abundantly clear what an excellent job Francois Raulin had done as editor for the past 3 years. This is not an easy task, particularly for the first time, and it’s fortunate that Jason Dworkin and I will be able to get it posted in early December, 2002, while it is still technically a Fall newsletter. We hope to be more or less on time for a Spring 2003 Newsletter next April. We all owe Francois a note of thanks for his efforts on behalf of our society.

Jason and I will make a few changes over the next three years, but the basic content of the Newsletter will remain the same: News related to our increasing understanding of life’s beginnings. To be successful, a newsletter depends on its readers, so the first thing we will do is to invite all ISSOLians to consider this as their newsletter, and to keep us informed about meetings, research news, career opportunities and other items that will be of interest to everyone.

This issue contains news of the July meeting in Oaxaca, which was so ably organized and run by Antonio Lazcano. Thank you Antonio for a superb job! The Society is in good hands as you begin your presidency. And we should all say Thank You to Bill Schopf for his efforts in bringing ISSOL through a significant growth phase during his presidency. We have never been in better shape in terms of numbers of members, and the funding that is available to support young investigators traveling to our meetings.

Which brings me to money matters. As outgoing Treasurer, I would like to provide a brief summary of the major expenses associated with running the Society, and how membership dues are used to promote Society activities. (A more detailed report can be found in the Executive Board section later in the newsletter.) In July 1999, after the San Diego meeting, the ISSOL checking account had $13,565 and there was $13,959 in the David White Memorial Fund as a Certificate of Deposit at the Bank of America, a total of $27,524. (By stipulation, the White fund is a reserve account, and only the interest from this fund can be used for ordinary Society expenses.) Three years later, in June of 2002 just before the Oaxaca meeting, the White fund has grown to $17,086, and the checking account to $40,104, which includes 1808 Euros in the European ISSOL account. Of this, $11,600 was a grant from the Astrobiology program to support young investigators traveling to the meeting.

The grant and accumulated dues allowed us to provide substantial support for most of the younger investigators who applied, as well as several senior investigators from countries lacking foreign exchange. We also received two generous private donations of $2500 and $1,000 to help support several senior investigators. ISSOL policy has been that dues income are to be spent largely on grants to students and younger investigators to support travel to the ISSOL meeting, and we were able to offer 22 travel awards (out of 30 requests) ranging from $300 to $1600 for a total of $18,750. ISSOL also provided a $1000 grant for the COSPAR meeting in 2001. Because of the additional funding available from the NASA Astrobiology program, ISSOL was also able to offrer $10,000 to the local organizing committee to support costs of running the meeting.

ISSOL is a membership-driven society, and members should have a say in how their dues are spent. Please let Andre Brack, our new treasurer know if you agree (or disagree) with the budget priorities, and your comments will be passed on to the ISSOL Council for consideration and action.

Very best wishes to all for the coming holidays, and let’s think about how to make the Beijing meeting the best ever!

Dave Deamer

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IN THIS ISSUE

ISSOL ’02. Reports from chairs of sessions

Executive Council report

Officers, 2002 — 2005

Treasurer’s report

The ISSOL Forum

Links useful to ISSOL members

Meeting Announcements

3^rd Interdisciplinary Symposium on Biological Chirality

Modena, Italy, April 30— May 4, 2003

NASA Astrobiology Institute General Meeting

Arizona State University, February 10 — 12, 2003

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ISSOL ’02. Session summaries.

The following summaries are brief reports from the Oaxaca meeting, June 30 — July 5, 2002, as reported by chairs of sessions.

Extraterrestrial Organic Molecules.
Reported by Sandra Pizzarello

In order to understand how life can begin on a planetary surface, we must first know what primary sources of organic compounds were available and the kinds of molecules that were likely to be present. On Monday morning, the first session of contributed papers was devoted to five talks focusing on this question.

Simoneit and Rushdi presented work on model thermocatalytic syntheses of lipid-like organic compounds. They demonstrated the formation of amides, nitriles and ester bonds under aqueous high temperature and pressure conditions, suggesting that reductive condensation is a possible abiotic route to such compounds. The compounds produced by this pathway have amphiphilic properties and are plausible components of early membrane structures.

Bar-nun and Owen discussed the contribution of noble gases, possibly nitrogen and water to the early Earth by icy planetesimals. Based on our current knowledge of HDO/H₂O and noble gases ratios in Earth oceans and atmosphere and of those of three comets analyzed so far, the authors concluded that large amounts of water and neon could have been contributed by comets to the early Earth but that a non-icy contribution has to be envisioned as well. The amount of water of cometary origin was calculated to be about a fourth of the present ocean. Assuming that comets are ~10% organic content by mass, this means that cometary delivery of organic compounds would have been as much as 38 kg/cm^-2, an amount far exceeding other pathways.

Meierhenrich presented collaborative work on laboratory simulations of photochemical synthesis in dense molecular clouds, conducted with the aim of understanding the interactions between interstellar gas and dust particles. The authors used representative interstellar electromagnetic radiation impinging on a mixture of H₂O, CO₂, CH₃OH, and NH₃, after deposition on a solid surface at 10-7 mbar and 12 K. Sixteen amino acids were identified between the products, and were found to be racemic. Such amino acids represent a possible source of at least some of the amino acids present in carbonaceous meteorites.

Kobayashi also described model experiments in which a cryostat loaded with an icy mixture of CO, NH₃, and water was kept at 10 K and irradiated with high-energy protons to simulate interstellar icy mantles conditions. Glycine, alanine, and ß-alanine were found in the hydrolysates of the irradiation products.

Pizzarello and Zolensky presented analyses of the molecular, chiral, and isotopic distribution of isovaline in two meteorites. The amino acid was found to have L-enantiomeric excesses that exceed the theoretical values if UV circularly polarized light had been the sole source of its asymmetry. This result cannot be attributed to contamination on the basis of their ¹³C enrichment. Analysis of the powders by XRD suggests a correlation between water alteration petrology and the relative abundance of isovaline.

Round Table: Primitive terrestrial environments
Reported by William Irvine

Two of the most fundamental questions for those interested in the origin of life are 1) what is the oldest evidence for life on Earth? and 2) what were the characteristics of the early terrestrial environment when life began? These topics were at the center of the Round Table on "Primitive Terrestrial Environments" chaired by Bill Irvine. For more than 20 years it has been argued that isotopically light graphite in the 3.8 Ga Isua Supracrustal Belt (ISB) in Greenland, presumably in sedimentary units, provided evidence for microbial activity almost immediately after the "late heavy bombardment" of the Earth and the rest of the inner solar system by the debris remaining from the formation of the planets. Since the largest impacts of the bombardment might have sterilized the Earth, the evidence seemed to support what Cyril Ponnamperuma once called "instant life". In relation to the second question listed above, basic issues include the atmospheric composition of the early Earth and the timing of the appearance of abundant oxygen, and the role of extraterrestrial organic matter in the origin of life.

?Mark van Zuilen stressed the importance of the geological setting in attempts to interpret carbon isotopic systematics. The UCSD group has studied the abundance, isotopic composition and petrographic associations of graphite in rocks from the 3.8 Ga ISB and concluded that most of the graphite occurs in carbonate-rich metasomatic rocks (i.e., rocks in which the chemical and isotopic composition are at least partially the result of secondary replacement processes). In contrast, the sedimentary units, including banded iron formations (BIFs), have exceedingly low graphite concentrations. The secondary origin of the graphite-containing rocks shows that their isotopic composition cannot have a biogenic origin. It seems likely that the graphite is formed by thermal decomposition of siderite (FeCO₃) and that the carbon isotopic abundances result from equilibrium isotope fractionation at a temperature between 500 and 600°C. Moreover, there is evidence that virtually all the reduced carbon present in the BIFs is recent contamination. 

Jim Kasting pointed out that there is new (and fairly definitive) information on the timing of the rise of atmospheric O₂, based on mass-independent fractionation of sulfur isotopes. The work was by James Farquhar et al. (Science, 2000). It basically confirms that O2 was low prior to ~2.3 Ga, as Dick Holland and others have been saying for some time. Kasting also discussed methane greenhouses in the Archean and the idea that the atmosphere may have been filled with a Titan-like photochemical smog or organic haze.

Jennifer Blank described possible inputs of extraterrestrial organic matter to the early Earth, concentrating on the survivability of organics during asteroid and cometary impacts. New laboratory experiments with hyper-velocity impact guns achieve pressures approaching that for some cometary impacts. Whereas some earlier calculations had predicted almost complete pyrolysis of organic compounds, the short duration of the impacts in fact results in much lower effective temperatures than would be expected from simple energy balance. The experiments show not only significant survival of amino acids in aqueous and icy mixtures, but also the synthesis of simple peptides.

Prebiotic catalysis and RNA synthesis.
Reported by James Cleaves.

The origin of the first biopolymers remains a central problem in origins of life research. Even assuming a ready supply of ribonucleotide monomers, great difficulties have been encountered in producing longer oligomers that would presumably have been necessary for catalysis as well as genetic information storage and transfer. Professor James Ferris gave an engaging account of past and current research in his laboratory regarding the clay-catalyzed polymerization of ribonucleotide phosphorimidazolides. The clay-catalyzed polymerization of novel activated mononucleotides in which the imidazole is replaced by an adenine moiety was also discussed. He showed results demonstrating the remarkable efficiency of polymerization catalysis by sodium montmorillonite over solution phase polymerization. A great degree of selectivity in the formation of the natural 3', 5' linked oligomers over 2', 5' linkages in the clay-catalyzed reaction was also demonstrated.

Round Table Discussion: "Prebiotic Synthesis: Past, Present and Future"
Reported by M. Chadha.

The round table included presentations by Jeffrey Bada, Nils Holm, Ram Krisnamurthy and Alan Schwartz. Bada discussed analytical results of carbonaceous chondrites and abundance and diversity of amino acids and other organic compounds found in them, suggesting that infall of organic-rich material was necessary for the origin of life on Earth. He presented the results of radiolytic decomposition of several amino acids. Bada suggested that Murchison-type material falling on early Earth could have delivered substantial amounts of amino acids, especially the higher molecular weight species.

Holm discussed the abiotic synthesis in ultramafic peridotile rock of the ocean floor starting with the formation of hydrogen and its interaction with CO₂ and CO (at high temperature ranges) as in Fischer-Tropsch Type synthesis. The formation of linear hydrocarbons with 16-29 carbon length isolated from hydrothermal systems of Mid-Atlantic Ridge was highlighted. He proposed that ultramafic rocks may provide the most potent environment for the initiation of chemical evolution.

Krishnamurthy discussed the important challenge of understanding the criteria by which Nature has chosen nucleic acids as a genetic system. He defined the goals of chemical etiology of nucleic acids structure at Scripps Laboratory, which investigates questions pertaining to the components of nucleic acids. He described investigations on the problem of prebiotic phosphorylation reactions and set the stage for a lively discussion.

Schwartz reported highlights in chemical evolution research but reminded the audience that several gaps still exist in our understanding of some of the most basic synthetic reactions, including the nature of products from Miller-Urey syntheses. He discussed problems related to chemically similar sets of isomers and homologues that yield self-inhibiting sets of reactants. Schwartz welcomed the fact that a small but growing class of selective reactions is becoming known.

Living in the RNA world.
Reported by Lluís Ribas de Pouplana

The ‘RNA world’ theory enjoys wide acceptance for a very simple reason: it is the best way to resolve the central paradox of molecular biology. If DNA makes proteins and proteins make DNA, how did it all start? Experimental support for the ‘RNA world’ comes mainly from two distinct fronts. Molecular biology is unveiling the central role of RNA in modern cell metabolism, a clear indication of its pivotal role in evolution. On the other hand, biochemistry is demonstrating that the catalytic potential of RNA justifies the hypothesis that ancestral genomes and primitive catalysts were made of RNA.

In the first talk of this session, Jerry Joyce explored our current understanding of the catalytic powers of RNA molecules. He described the selection of self-assembling ribozymes capable of generating bi-dimensional networks of interacting subunits. The generation of large catalytic RNA surfaces might provide a link between template-assisted polymerization on inorganic matrices and the formation of large complexes of catalytic bio-molecules.

The molecular structure of the ribosome was the topic of Harry Noller’s presentation. Crystallography reveals that the catalytic center of this macromolecule is formed solely of RNA, an observation that closes a long-standing debate. The ribosome is now seen as an RNA machine that uses associated proteins to gain structural stability. Further clues as to the evolution of the ribosome may come from the detailed analysis of the interactions between its individual components. In particular, the interactions of the two ribosomal subunits with different parts of the tRNA molecule are revealed by the crystal structure. The catalytic subunit of the ribosome binds the acceptor stem of the tRNA molecule, but not its anticodon stem-loop, which is recognized by the small ribosomal subunit. The possibility that this situation could be a remnant from ancestral translation mechanisms was discussed.

The First Cells. Round table discussion.
Reported by Dave Deamer

How cellular life began on the Earth remains a fundamental unsolved question for biology, particularly from the astrobiological perspective. In order to answer this question, we must first understand how certain organic compounds can assemble into more complex molecular systems and then evolve those basic properties that are critical to life. Such properties include the capture of energy and nutrients from the environment to support growth, and manufacturing copies of polymeric biomolecules. We must then attempt to learn how such systems begin the evolutionary process toward a compartmentalized and self-regulating catalytic system that can undergo genetic change between generations.

Each of the participants in this roundtable discussed specific aspects of this larger problem. Deamer began by describing systems of amphiphilic molecules that self-assemble from plausible prebiotic organic compounds and have the capacity to encapsulate catalytic macromolecules such as polymerases, thereby providing a possible source of the first cellular membranes. A particular point of interest is that such systems are unable to form in aqueous media like sea water, due to unfavorable interactions with divalent cations (Ca²⁺, Mg²⁺, Fe²⁺) that were likely to be present in early oceans. Given the alternative, fresh water environments would be more conducive to the self-assembly processes leading to early forms of cellular life.

Laura Landweber noted that the genetic code has a certain amount of flexibility. For instance, the stop codons UAR and UGA are translated as the codons for glutamine, tryptophan and cysteine in ciliates. Such changes provide clues for understanding the components that assembled in primitive translation mechanisms. For instance, protein release factors may play a role in eukaryotic code changes, but are more likely to involve interactions between RNA and the ribosome in prokaryotes.

Renato Fani discussed the manner in which metabolic pathways can evolve in early cells. He noted that the emergence of such biosynthetic pathways would allow primitive cells to move away from a dependence on exogenous sources of organic compounds that were required for the origin of life. Earlier proposals by Horowitz, Granick, Waley and Ycas and Jensen were described. Fani then noted that sequence comparisons that are now possible provide a powerful new approach to the question evolution of metabolic pathways, particularly recent discoveries of gene duplication in coding for protein domains, motifs and operons.

Mario Soberon completed the round table with a discussion of thiamin pyrophosphate (TPP) biosythesis. He noted that gene expression of the enzymes related to TPP synthesis is the 38 base "thi box" sequence. Unlike other gene regulators that require a sensing protein,, the thi box seems to directly sense thiamin concentration and promote hairpin formation at the ribosome binding site, thereby preventing thiC translation. The fact that a protein sensor is absent in the thiamin regulatory pathway suggests that it may represent an ancient form of gene regulation, perhaps going as far back as the RNA world.

 

Genomes, Extremophiles, and Evolution. Roundtable Discussion

Whole genome analysis is impacting our understanding of biological evolution, both for extant species as well as their most probable ancient predecessors. To make the best assessments, researchers are taking multifaceted approaches to combine analyses of bioinformatics data with detailed definitions of current environmental ecosystems. In the round table discussion, four approaches were highlighted that provided clues to the origin of life, the origin and evolution of DNA genomes, an extant analogue for chemolithotrophy for early life, and the genomic comparison of 3 hyperthermophilic archaea.

Janet Siefert reported that a very ancient yet promiscuous operon involving iron-sulfur cluster formation, is one of the few conserved operons across all prokaryotes that is not involved in translation. Indeed, although its promiscuous nature is evidenced by a number of horizontal gene transfers, phylogenetic analysis reveals that at least one version of the operon has an evolutionary history that is in agreement with the ribosomal RNA tree of life.

Patrick Forterre addressed the advent and possible evolution of a DNA genome based biology. In a second stage of the RNA world, he suggests that DNA was invented as a modified form of RNA, stating that comparative genomic data is in in agreement with DNA haven been invented at least twice. He theorized that viruses were the agent that invented the DNA modification and that comparative genomic data is in agreement with this hypothesis.

Yutaka Kawarabayasi reported on an extensive genomic sequencing and annotation effort that included three hyperthermophilic Archaea, Pyrococcus horikoshii, Aeropyrum pernix, and Sulfolobus tokodaii. A total of 7,581 potential protein-coding regions were assigned to the three extremophiles and features specific to each species were extracted from the data. He also reported on direct sequencing of environmental DNA prepared from ocean and hot spring environments without PCR amplification, the results indicating that there was a great deal more diversity in the natural populations than the current database of 16s rRNA sequences indicated.

Ricardo Amils took the discussion to a macroscopic level by showing in colorful detail the Tinto River in southwestern Spain. The Tinto is remarkable in that a constant acidic pH is maintained as well as a high concentration of heavy metals. He reports that the extreme conditions are maintained by the active metabolism of the chemolithotrophic community thriving there. Using a variety of conventional and molecular ecology techniques, he finds that although sulfur metabolism plays an important role in the ecosystem, iron may be the most likely key element. In a geomicrobiolgoical model system, he theorizes that iron may not only be an important electron donor, but also an electron acceptor for anaerobic respiration in certain parts of the river.

The fossil record of life.
Reported by Victor Valdes-Lopez

The first presentation by Brian Brister was entitled Fe isotope fractionaion and the origins of banded iron formations. In his talk, Brister proposed that Fe isotope shifts may offer a useful method for distinguishing between three different mechanisms of Fe oxidation. Frances Westall (Centre de Biophysique Moleculaire, CNRS, France), presented her work on the diversity and distribution of early Archaean life, which offered a fresh view to the controversy of the evidence of the first organisms. Sedimentological analysis of the Barbenton and Pilbara greenstone belts in South Africa and Australia, respectively, document potential ancient habitable niches of various types (more than 3.4 b. y. old rocks). On the basis of macroscopic to microscopic studies, Westall documented the existence of microbial mats and microbial fossils. Although no morphological evidence for cyanobacterial fossils was found, other fossilized bacteria were found exhibiting filamentous structures. Interestingly, although the two areas were not cojoined in that period, there is a strong similarity between the forms found in both Barbenton and the Pilbara.

The last presentation on non-enzymatic RNA polymerization in eutectic phases in ice was given by David Deamer. A problem of the RNA-world hypothesis is that the monomer solutions for the non-enzymatic polymerization of RNA were likely to be very dilute. In this work it was shown that the formation of homopolymers from phosphoimidazoline-activated uridine using eutectic phases in ice at -18 °C proceeds efficiently in a concentration-dependent manner. Furthermore, when mixtures of the four nucleobases were used, random oligomer fragments were synthesized under the same conditions, again as a function of the amount of each nucleobase in the initial mixture. These results suggest that Archaean ice deposits could have provided a broad niche for the synthesis of biopolymers or their precursors on the early Earth.

Fossil records of life
Reported by Frances Westall

The morning was session was dedicated to an analysis of the fossil records of life, commencing with two fascinating plenary lectures that provided a suitable general background to later detailed reports concerning various aspects of the fossil evidence for life.

Considering the recent controversies regarding the evidence for (cyanobacterial) life in rocks 3.45 b.y.-old from the Pilbara in Australia (Schopf et al., 2002; Brasier et al., 2002), George Fox and his collaborators (Janet Siefert, Kirt Martin, Yeu Li, Tom McNeil and Shyla Yerrapragada) provided "Genomic insights into cyanobacterial evolution". Using a newly developed software system, the Genome Display Tool, Fox and his colleagues were able to compare cyanobacterial genomes from six different species, thus allowing them to demonstrate that certain genes are uniquely shared by the cyanobacteria In fact, they also confirmed that only a small number of genes are common to photosynthetic bacteria. The function of the cyanobacterial signature genes, however, is largely unknown suggesting that these organisms have characteristic phenotypic properties in addition to oxygenic photosynthesis that likely were present 2.1 b. y. ago. It was also shown that current methods for identifying recent horizontal gene transfer events were largely inconsistent with one another. Moreover, in light of new knowledge as to which genes are conserved and which are not, it does not appear that any of the established methods are especially effective in identifying recent lateral transfer.

In his lecture on "Isotopic evolution of the biogeochemical carbon cycle during the Precambrian", David Des Marais provided an overview of the carbon cycle during this long period of time (about 86% of Earth’s history), putting into context the appearance of oxygenic photosynthesis in organisms and the gradual accumulation of oxygen in the atmosphere. He noted that there was a broader range in the isotopic signal of carbon in sediments older than 2.4 b.y. ago, probably due to the fact that on a world dominated by anaerobic organisms, the range in isotopic fractionation would be greater. The photosynthetic metabolic pathway, and especially the oxygenic pathway, is far more efficient in energy production than anaerobic metabolisms. In an anaerobic world, initial oases of oxygen produced by oxygenic photosynthesisers would have disappeared overnight; the build-up of oxygen in the atmosphere was perhaps aided by gradual loss of hydrogen to space via atmospheric hydrogen and methane produced due to fermentation.  Oxygen buildup also was aided by burial by tectonic processes of sediments containing the organic remains of an abundant biosphere.

History, Philosophy, and Education in the Origin of Life.
Reported by Juli Peretó.

The third session of Thursday July 4 was devoted to philosophical aspects on the origin of life research. Zann Gill (NASA Ames Research Center) reviewed the way scientists generate hypotheses and analysed several case studies. She used the concept "abduction", besides the traditional terms "deduction" and "induction", to characterize the mental process of the creative scientist. Origin of life theorists use two kinds of life definitions: one that considers the material components and functioning of living beings, including physiological, metabolic, biochemical or genetic perspectives. The other defines life independently of its material basis and considers its underlying principles, limits and boundaries, as well as the physical principles related to life processes. The author briefly analyzed, among others, Cairns-Smith’s views on the origin of life problem.

Bela A. Balazs discussed a general view of life as a part of a cosmological replication cycle. This author presented life as "the most expressive and complete manifestation known of the universe’s cosmological capacity for complexity". Nevertheless living beings are rarely conceived as cosmologically relevant structures. Professor Balazs emphasized the notion that life is not a blind chance but an integral part of the universe and that the emergence of intelligent life is a robust phenomenon and plays an important role in the cosmological replication cycle.

Carol E. Cleland (Cleland, University of Colorado, and Chyba, SETI Institute and Stanford University) discussed different ways of constructing definitions and the difficulty —or impossibility— to define life. The author argued that a satisfactory answer to the question "what is life?" would require a general theory of the nature of living systems.

Finally, Juli Peretó (Ruiz-Mirazo, Centre for Astrobiology-Madrid, Peretó, University of València, and Moreno, University of Basc Country) presented a proposal of a universal definition of life. The complexity of life has at least two levels that must be considered in any good defintion —i.e. a minimal, universal, operational, congruent, meaningful, and explanatory definition. There are an individual aspect and a ecological/collective aspect. The authors proposed to join the concepts of "autonomy" and "open-ended evolution" to properly cover both aspects. In this way a living being (an organism) should be defined as "any autonomous system with open-ended evolution capacities". The minimal and sufficient ingredients to have such a system are: a semi-permeable active boundary, an energy transduction apparatus, and two types of polymers with well differentiated activities as catalysts and records respectively.

Astrobiology/Exobiology
Reported by Janet Siefert

The session devoted to Astrobiology had two contributions. Michael Meyer from NASA Headquarters presented the historical evolution of Astrobiology, starting from the NASA Exobiology Program, which has grown to include the NASA Astrobiology Institute. This is a collection of competitively selected groups of researchers attacking different astrobiological problems that are outlined in the astrobiology road map, in a highly interdisciplinary mode. Meyer emphasized the importance of two key programs for Astrobiology: ASTID (Astrobiology Science and Technology for Instrument Development) and ASTEP (Astrobiology Science and Technology for Exploring Planets) which are devoted to the development of instrumentation and methodologies for the exploration of life in extreme environments on Earth or other planetary bodies. The second talk was presented by Athena Coustenis and described an analysis of Titan`s atmosphere. This atmospheric system bears interesting similarities with our own planet’s earliest atmposphere, having significant concentrations of nitrogen, methane and hydrogen capable reacting to produce organic compounds like hydrocarbons and nitriles. Coustenis discussed how ground observation facilities can be used to investigate Titan’s meteorological phenomena like haze variations (using adaptive optics), tropospheric clouds (using round-based spectroscopy) and organic synthesis (infrared spectral analysis.) The Saturn-bound Cassini/Huygens ESA/NASA mission scheduled for arrival at 2004 should clarify the atmospheric properties and composition of this interesting planetary body.

Astrobiology/Exobiology
Reported by R. Amils

The papers selected for this session analyzed physicochemical conditions on extra-terrestrial objects in connection of their fitness to the existence of life. The presence of water is regarded as one of the most critical factors for the emergence of living systems. The paper of Cristiano Cosmovici (Istituto Scienze Cosmici e Planetarie, CNR, Rome, Italy) was devoted to a radioastronomical search of water in comets and exoplanets. The impact of Shoemaker-Levy/9 comet fragments into Jovian atmosphere gave astronomers a unique opportunity to detect for the first time the 22 GHz water MASER emission from an object within Solar System as well as to measure the amount of water that can be delivered by comets to planets. The results point to comets as an extremely powerful source of water in this regard. The estimated value of water impact reaches tens of billions tons of water during the period in which a planetary atmosphere is in a condition suitable for the emergence of life. The same approach is now applied to a search of water in exoplanets within 50 light years. The program started in 1998 and using 132000 multichannel spectrometer coupled with 32 m dish Medicina radiotelescope has brought to a possible detection of water in planetary systems around epsilon Eridani and upsilon Andromedae.

Up to now, terrestrial organisms are the only known living forms, and their fitness to martian conditions is an important aspect in the search of traces of life on mars. Petra Retberg (DLR Institute of Aerospace Medicine, Koeln, Germany) presented a paper on the satellite orbiting simulation of some bio-experiments to be included into a program of further exploration of a surface of this planet. The main goal is to clarify possible survival of microorganisms, especially resistant bacterial spores, after they are subjected to intense non-filtered solar UV-radiation in presence of the mineral samples mimicking martian soil. The MARSTOX experiment will be performed by ESA as a part of the FOTON M1 mission in the end of 2002. After the Bacillus subtilis spores and cells are exposed on the outer surface of the FOTON M1satellite and then returned to Earth, their viability and mutation ratio will be compared with control samples on the Earth and subjected to irradiation from artificial UV- sources simulating terrestrial and martian conditions.

Bruce Jakosky compared Mars and Titan in his talk. On Mars, temperatures may rise at times, and in selected locations, into the range we experience commonly on Earth. However, the availability of liquid water and organic compounds on Mars remains problematic. Sites where water may have existed on the surface within the last few million years provide readily accessible sites to look for evidence of life. Jakosky argued that liquid water may have formed in polar regions during periods of high obliquity, either as such or as thin films within the ice and soil. If life sustained itself under such circumstances, then we might detect remnants of it, for example in the form of spores or dormant organisms, if we targeted a lander to these regions. Titan appears to have abundant organic materials in its atmosphere, and presumably ice on its surface, but at temperatures far below those associated with life on Earth. It is possible however that volcanic activity and meteorite impacts may occasionally have melted a portion of the surface, allowing chemical self-organization in the direction of life. Characterization of the atmosphere is a necessary preliminary step to understanding the biological potential of that world. François Raulin summarized the approaches that have to determine the organic composition of this atmosphere by direct observation, laboratory simulations, and theoretical modeling. Although Titan’s atmosphere is dominated by nitrogen, with some methane, about 200 other compounds have been detected in smaller amounts. The list is dominated by hydrocarbons and nitriles, but ethylene oxide (oxirane), and traces of water vapor may now be added to it. The Cassini Huygens mission is expected to extend our knowledge of the chemistry of Titan considerably in the near future.

 

 

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Treasurer’s Report. July 1999 — July 2002

Open Business Meeting Treasurer's Report

(*Dues for 2002 are being collected and are not included in this report. US$ unless otherwise stated)

Income

Checking account
Starting balance July 1999	13,565
Astrobiology grant, June 2002	11,600
European account July 1999	0
European account June 2002	1,808 Euros
Dues and donations*	13,131
Ending balance June 2002	40,104
David White account
Starting balance July 1999	13,959
Interest income	3,127
Ending balance June 2002	17,086
Total assets, June 2002	57,190
Total income July 1999 - June 2002	29,666

Expenditures

Travel costs for site visit	3,517
Office expenses ISSOL treasurer
2/8/00 HP ink jet printer	232.72
6/8/01 Postage	10.01
9/22/01 UC Regents (photocopying)	91.59
9/11/01 Complete Mailing Service	185
10/11/01 Complete mailing service	168.88
10/23/01Chemistry Department (postage)	200
Total	888.20
Services
ISSOL web site maintenance	1,020
5/1/00 CSC Tax representative fee	178
5/2/02 CSC Tax representative fee	265
5/24/02 Registration accounting fee	193
6/28/02 Registration accounting fee	263
Total	1919
Other
2/13/02 COSPAR donation	1,000
6/10/02 Donation to LOC	10,000
7/15/02 Medals	1,083
Total expenditures	18,407
Available travel grant funds June 2002	21,696
Junior investigator awards accepted	12,950
Senior investigator awards accepted	5,800
Total travel awards	18,750
Remaining funds August 1, 2002	2,947
David White Fund	17,086
Remaining total assets	20,033

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ISSOL@yahoo

At the Open Business meeting I was asked to create a web chat room for ISSOL members and the ISSOL Executive Council. Since I am not a programmer, it was decided to try a free site to test if there was sufficient interest in the idea. On July 11, 2002 ISSOL@yahoo was founded. While users are subjected to advertising, it is a secure, private environment with many features. The forum is unlisted and its membership is open only to invited members, thus your privacy is assured.

In the following week over 500 invitations were emailed. If you did not receive one, then contact Claudia Schmitz to update your email address and request a new invitation.

Membership allows you to receive and send messages to every other member.

If you have a free Yahoo account then there are many options open to you. With it you can:

• have the messages forwarded to to email address of your choice and edit other preferences
• view the archive of messages
• make and take opinion polls
• upload files, photos, and links
• participate in an ISSOL live chat room
• share a database
• search, view, and edit (responsibly) the ISSOL membership roster
• and post messages

Useful notes:

Please be aware that if you reply to the forum you will be sending your message to everyone else in the group as well (private conversations can be annoying to others and possibly embarrassing to you). Since all old messages are archived, there is no need to habitually quote the entire previous posting in your reply.

Also, if you set vacation message, please set your preferences to the "Don't send me email" setting, adjust you email filters, or ask me for help to avoid forwarding your vacation message to every other ISSOL@yahoo member.

In addition, the site has 30 Mb of storage for files, photos, etc for exchange and all members have fairly broad privileges. I am sure there is no need to remind you to use them responsibly. At the same time I hope you will experiment with the features of the site. If it meets our needs, so be it. However, if it turns out to be too limiting, there are many other options at various prices.

Currently there are 86 members, but not a lot of discussion. If you would like to comment on what you believe the future relationship between ISSOL and Astrobiology and between ISSOL and Bioastronomy should be, click here.

Jason Dworkin

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LINKS

We are compiling a list of links you might find useful for this web site. Please submit web sites you find useful to the links section of ISSOL@yahoo or to Jason Dworkin. When you do so, please provide the URL and a simple descriptive sentence to be posted. Remember the ISSOL privacy policy if you wish to post the URL of a member outside of the secure environment of ISSOL@yahoo.

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MEETING ANNOUNCMENTS
These and other announcements can be found on our meetings page

3^rd Interdisciplinary Symposium on Biological Chirality.
Modena, Italy, April 30— May 4, 2003
http://www.isbc.unimo.it

Scope

Biological chirality means those molecular phenomena of life which are based on (almost) exclusive role (and formation) of only one enantiomer of chiral molecules involved in chemical reactions related to life.

The importance of these fields was recognised also by awarding both the Nobel Prizes in Chemistry in 2001 (enantioselective catalysis, W.S. Knowles, R. Noyori, K.B. Sharpless) and in 2002 (peptide chemistry, J.B. Fenn, K.Tanaka, K. Wüthrich).

The Symposium will be dedicated to honour these outstanding scientists.

In spite of considerable progress achieved in the last decade some of the most important questions about the origin of biological chirality and its relation to life phenomena are still open, or, at least not sufficiently documented experimentally. The Organisers believe that the joint efforts and exchange of ideas from various fields of Natural Sciences will promote the solution of these questions as well as it will help to find important new connections to praxis in technology, medicine, pharma and several other fields.

Topics

The main topic of the Symposium is: chirality in chemical and biological evolution. In more particular terms, the following fields are encouraged:

1. Phenomenology and theory of biological chirality;
2. Macroscopic manifestation of biological chirality (morphology, biocrystallization, chiral movements, etc.);
3. Palaeo-chirality ("survival" and significance of chiral organic molecules in fossils);
4. Exceptions to biological chirality (chemistry and consequences);
5. Related biochemistry and model experiments;
6. Practical aspects (food chemistry, pharmaceuticals, polymers, biophysics of polarised light, non-linear optics, geochronology, stratigraphy, etc.);

 

 

NASA Astrobiology Institute General Meeting 2003
February 10 — 12, 2003.
Hosted by Arizona State University
Jack Farmer and Robert Blankenship, Program Organizers
http://nai.arc.nasa.gov/institute/general_meeting_2003

We look forward with great anticipation to the next General Meeting of the NASA Astrobiology Institute. The meeting will be hosted by NAI's Lead Team at Arizona State University, on the beautiful ASU campus in Tempe, Arizona. Please plan to attend and be a part of this vital, community-building event! We expect an intellectually rich program that will include:

History of Planetary Habitability

Solar System evolution

History of planetary environmental change

Prebiotic chemistry - in the Solar System and on the early Earth

Origin(s) of Living Systems

Universal requirements and properties of living systems

Models for the first living systems

Evolution of Life

Archean paleontology and the earliest records of life

Molecular phylogenetics

Events in biosphere evolution

Origin and evolution of chemotrophic and photosynthetic systems

Distribution of Life in extreme environments

Mechanisms for survival in extreme environments

"Weird life"

Exploring for Life in the Solar System

Basic exploration strategies

Models for extraterrestrial life

Current mission opportunities and what new discoveries have been made, including:

Mars (mission updates, new results from MGS and Odyssey, MER plans)

Europa and the other Galilean moons (update on oceans in the outer Solar System)

Titan (Huygens probe science)

Contour, SOFIA, Stardust

Exploring for Habitable Planets Beyond the Solar System

Atmospheric modeling, surface properties, and exo-geophysics

Search methods and mission opportunities

Recognizing and Interpreting Biosignatures

Interpreting the Precambrian fossil record

Education and Public Outreach

The Virtual Institute: Values, Behaviors and Technologies….

(And much more…)