Rosalind Franklin Society Proudly Announces the 2022 Award Recipient for Astrobiology

AstrobiologyVol. 23, No. 8 AnnouncementFree AccessRosalind Franklin Society Proudly Announces the 2022 Award Recipient for AstrobiologyLaura M. BargeLaura M. BargePlanetary Sciences, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA, USASearch for more papers by this authorPublished Online:14 Aug 2023https://doi.org/10.1089/ast.2023.29079.rfs2022AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB Permissions & CitationsPermissionsDownload CitationsTrack CitationsAdd to favorites Back To Publication ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmail The Rosalind Franklin Society (RFS), in partnership with Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers, enthusiastically congratulate our distinguished recipient of the 2022 annualRFS Award in Sciencefor this journal, which recognizes the outstanding research and published work of women and underrepresented minority scientists, physicians, and engineers.Laura M. Barge, Laura E. Rodriguez, Jessica M. Weber, and Bethany P. Theiling, “Determining the ‘Biosignature Threshold’ for Life Detection on Biotic, Abiotic, or Prebiotic Worlds,” Astrobiology 22, no. 4 (April 2022): 481–493, http://doi.org/10.1089/ast.2021.0079.AbstractThe field of prebiotic chemistry has demonstrated that complex organic chemical systems that exhibit various life-like properties can be produced abiotically in the laboratory. Understanding these chemical systems is important for astrobiology and life detection since we do not know the extent to which prebiotic chemistry might exist or have existed on other worlds. Nor do we know what signatures are diagnostic of an extant or “failed” prebiotic system. On Earth, biology has suppressed most abiotic organic chemistry and overprints geologic records of prebiotic chemistry; therefore, it is difficult to validate whether chemical signatures from future planetary missions are remnant or extant prebiotic systems. The “biosignature threshold” between whether a chemical signature is more likely to be produced by abiotic versus biotic chemistry on a given world could vary significantly, depending on the particular environment, and could change over time, especially if life were to emerge and diversify on that world. To interpret organic signatures detected during a planetary mission, we advocate for (1) gaining a more complete understanding of prebiotic/abiotic chemical possibilities in diverse planetary environments and (2) involving experimental prebiotic samples as analogs when generating comparison libraries for “life detection” mission instruments.BiosketchDr. Laurie Barge is a research scientist at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA's) Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. She received her BS in astronomy and astrophysics from Villanova University and her PhD in geological sciences from the University of Southern California; after graduate school she was a Caltech postdoctoral scholar and then a NASA Astrobiology Institute postdoctoral fellow. Currently, Barge co-leads the JPL Origins and Habitability Laboratory, a research group that studies how life can emerge and be detected in planetary environments. Barge's research focuses on seafloor hydrothermal vents as planetary analogs and how prebiotic chemistry can emerge on Earth and other worlds; she leads various NASA project teams about origin of life, hydrothermal vent exploration, and planetary habitability. She is also involved in NASA missions as the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) investigation scientist on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and a participating scientist on NASA's Mars Science Laboratory. For her astrobiology research Barge has received the JPL Lew Allen Award, the NASA Early Career Public Achievement Medal, and the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers.FiguresReferencesRelatedDetails Volume 23Issue 8Aug 2023 InformationCopyright 2023, Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishersTo cite this article:Laura M. Barge.Rosalind Franklin Society Proudly Announces the 2022 Award Recipient for Astrobiology.Astrobiology.Aug 2023.ii-ii.http://doi.org/10.1089/ast.2023.29079.rfs2022Published in Volume: 23 Issue 8: August 14, 2023PDF download