Life in the Atacama

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Life in the Atacama Science Team Effort, 1st
Year Field Campaign Striving to Integrate
Biology, Geology, Autonomous Exploration
James Dohm, Kimberly Warren-Rhodes, Peter
Coppin, Greg Fisher, Jonathon Foster, Bob
Anderson
NASA AMES University of Arizona Carnegie
Mellon JPL
Nathalie Cabrol Edmon Grin
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Primary Objective

• Map the extent of life in the
• Atacama Desert through
• autonomous navigation, which
• includes identifying life and smartly
• mapping out high probability
• localities/environments that
• may contain life (sniffing/scouting
• out the localities along long traverses
• then unfolding the high probability
• localities) using integrated
• instrument vantages (scalable)
• that collectively indicate life.

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The field test included 5 days of training and
remote reconnaissance, 5 days of the field
experiment (5 sols), and 2 days of debriefing and
preliminary report preparation.
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Choosing the Traverse

• Traverse based on
• water/life potentials
• (e.g., possible structurally- controlled
  releases of water/seeps/collapsehypothesized
  dissolution cavities related to ground H20)
• Map units based from reconnaissance geologic
  mapping (including interpretation)
• Lacustrine (p1,p2,p3 basin/light albedo
  surface),
• Fan (f),
• Scalloped terrain (s desert pavement/ salars),
• Volcanic province (to (east-southeast), and
• Mountainous
• (d terrain to the west).

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Dont go into the basin, you will kill the
rover!
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Collectively defining traverse
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Science Objectives

• Locate, characterize, and identify habitats and
  unambiguously confirm life through field testing
  the rover Sciencecraft, Hyperion, which has
  onboard autonomous navigation, as well as
  high-resolution photographic, spectral, and
  fluorescence sampling capabilities.
• Based on our effort, contribute information to
  the other team members to improve upon
  Hyperions ability to locate, characterize, and
  identify habitats and unambiguously confirm life
• Collect 10 or more samples

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Science Objectives (cont.)

• Traverse more than 10 km
• Properly characterize the geology and potential
  life-containing habitats, realizing there is a
  direct linkage
• Prepare the Science Team for the upcoming field
  seasons, which includes developing strategies
  that optimally integrate Science disciplines to
  effectively locate, characterize, and identify
  life-containing habitats through rover
  exploration (learning year)

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• Preliminary Results
• Geology
• Environments Tectonically-controlled basin,
  lacustrine, aeolian, alluvial fans, desert
  pavement fluvial?, volcanic?
• Winds, moisture (mid-morning to mid afternoon)
  structurally controlled influences (local and
  regional)
• Materials
• General - conglomeratic/poorly sorted (cobbles,
  pebbles, fine grained matrix) mantle that
  blankets precipitates in places aeolian
  deposits desert pavement
• Specific - Fe-bearing soils (all materials had a
  component of this) precipitate (hydrated
  sulfatesone positive ID was sample 16 gypsum)
  possible hematite or goerthite rocks possibly
  coated with desert varnish or caliche (e.g.,
  secondary weathering products (Samples 10,13,14)
  soils containing possible clay or carbonates
  (e.g., Sample 7, 10, and 12) in general,
  hydroxilated materials (Samples 22-27), volcanics
  (?).
• Few reconnaissance-selected sampling sites were
  reached

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• Biology
• 3 main types of habitats (saline, desert
  pavement, soils)
• 27 samples were acquired 12 indicated weak or
  strong chlorophyll signature from the spectral
  data analysis, and only one showed a strong
  signature for chlorophyll from spectral data
  (Sample 3)
• Florescence data available to the Science Team
  for Year 1 could not confirm the unambiguous
  presence of chlorophyll-based life -- instrument
  suffered from stray reflected light entering into
  the camera creating artifacts, however did prove
  that is was capable of detecting low light
  levels.
• To confirm life, more than one sensor may be
  needed to confirm a positive (e.g., BOTH spectral
  results AND fluorescence dye results should be
  coupled to help confirm life).

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Climate

• Elevated moisture from mid morning to mid
  afternoon
• Strong wind regimes evident from field data and
  geomorphic features (yardang-type features
  mantle)
• Clouds observed in the pan cam imagery

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Environmental

• Irregular topography (tectonic, erosional,
  depositonal)
• Holes and local irregularities (terraces and
  swales) dissolution of precipitate material
  varmints?

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Science Objectives (cont.)

• Traverse more than 10 km
• not quite, but longest ever autonomously
  navigated rover science experiment (approximately
  2.3 km)
• Properly characterize the geology and potential
  life-containing habitats, realizing there is a
  direct linkage
• further work is necessary, but made great
  strides..
• Identifying life remotely
• further work is necessary, but made great
  strides..

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Science Objectives (cont.)

• Prepare the Science Team for the upcoming field
  seasons, which includes developing strategies
  that optimally integrate Science disciplines to
  effectively locate, characterize, and identify
  life-containing habitats through rover
  exploration
• made great strides, yet have learned
  ten-fold
• Lessons Learned
• Sampling (field vs. remote)
• Observation (local and out of field of view),
  Identification, Cataloging, Verification from
  Field, Retracing steps
• Need significant improvement
• Analysis of data (In transit as possible) -
  Dependent on Smart Sampling
• Need significant improvement comparative
  analysis extremely difficult (e.g., visual vs.
  spectral vs. fluorescence)

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• Lessons Learned (cont.)

• For upcoming field seasons developing,
  identifying, and refining an approach to
  optimally integrate Science disciplines with
  engineering, robotics, and immersive remote
  experiences to effectively locate, characterize,
  and identify (harvest) life-containing habitats
  through rover exploration
• The Science team must come to an optimal point
  with other team members to create and effective
  robot (rover really needs to become
  reconnaissance biologists/geologists/navigator)
  queries? Did we drive the rover where we wanted
  to go? Partly Did we sample where we wanted to
  sample? Partly Did we reach our determined
  sample destinies (prime sites based on
  reconnaissance) Partly? After 1st learning
  year, great strides have been made

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Primary Observations for Next Year

• Field/Remote interface (sampling verification,
  limitations/lines of site, traverse
  accuracyremote vs. field workshops collective
  multidiscipline groundtruthing)
• Data from different instruments need to register
  (e.g., fluorescence with spectral to cofindently
  detect life) movie information (visible,
  infrared, etc., coupled with, for example,
  fluorescence and moisture sensors could flag high
  probability areas)
• Synergism among teams/disciplines (engineering,
  robotics, biology, geology hydrology,
  spectroscopy)
• Clear objectives

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Mars Rationale for Effort

• Mars has been a dynamic planet (magmatic/tectonic)
  
• Mars is a water-enriched planet with many
  Earth-like traits
• Long-lived environments where magma and water
  interacts (energy water life?)
• Hyperion effort forms the building blocks for
  harvesting the rich information that awaits us

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May our synergistic team efforts
yieldtremendous fruits