Journal
ASTROBIOLOGY
Volume 19, Issue 2, Pages 145-157Publisher
MARY ANN LIEBERT, INC
DOI: 10.1089/ast.2018.1897
Keywords
EXPOSE-R2; BIOMEX; Habitability; Limits of life; Extremophiles; Mars
Funding
- Italian Space Agency (ASI) [051-R.0, 063-R.0]
- German Aerospace Center (DLR-grants: Department of Infrastructure and Management, Astrobiology Laboratories through a grant DLR-FuW-Project BIOMEX/Department of Radiation Biology by grant DLR-FuE-Projekt ISS LIFE, Programm RF-FuW, Teilprogramm 475) [2474128]
- German Helmholtz Association through the Helmholtz-Alliance Planetary Evolution and Life
- Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (MINECO, project SUBLIMAS SUrvival of Bacteria and LIchens on Mars Analogs and Space) [ESP2015-69810-R]
- Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (MINECO) [CTM2015-64728-C2-1-R]
- National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine [47/2017]
- Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
- German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology (BMWi) [50WB1152, 50WB1153]
- Italian Antarctic National Museum (MNA)
- ERC Advanced Grant HOME [339231]
- ESA
- BIOMEX project [ESA-ILSRA 2009-0834]
- European Research Council (ERC) [339231] Funding Source: European Research Council (ERC)
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BIOMEX (BIOlogy and Mars EXperiment) is an ESA/Roscosmos space exposure experiment housed within the exposure facility EXPOSE-R2 outside the Zvezda module on the International Space Station (ISS). The design of the multiuser facility supports-among others-the BIOMEX investigations into the stability and level of degradation of space-exposed biosignatures such as pigments, secondary metabolites, and cell surfaces in contact with a terrestrial and Mars analog mineral environment. In parallel, analysis on the viability of the investigated organisms has provided relevant data for evaluation of the habitability of Mars, for the limits of life, and for the likelihood of an interplanetary transfer of life (theory of lithopanspermia). In this project, lichens, archaea, bacteria, cyanobacteria, snow/permafrost algae, meristematic black fungi, and bryophytes from alpine and polar habitats were embedded, grown, and cultured on a mixture of martian and lunar regolith analogs or other terrestrial minerals. The organisms and regolith analogs and terrestrial mineral mixtures were then exposed to space and to simulated Mars-like conditions by way of the EXPOSE-R2 facility. In this special issue, we present the first set of data obtained in reference to our investigation into the habitability of Mars and limits of life. This project was initiated and implemented by the BIOMEX group, an international and interdisciplinary consortium of 30 institutes in 12 countries on 3 continents. Preflight tests for sample selection, results from ground-based simulation experiments, and the space experiments themselves are presented and include a complete overview of the scientific processes required for this space experiment and postflight analysis. The presented BIOMEX concept could be scaled up to future exposure experiments on the Moon and will serve as a pretest in low Earth orbit.
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