I’m not sure if most of you heard but there were “signs of life” find in osiris rex’s asteroids samples as in they found 14 similar amino acids similar to us. I was wondering if this means that life DOES exist on another planet or asteroid or if it just raises the POSSIBILITY of life existing ? I’ll link the article

https://www.sci.news/space/amino-acids-salts-asteroid-bennu-samples-13624.html

to summerize, i initially wanted to study neuroscience (i am interested in the study of the brain, drugs, neurodegen. diseases etc) but due to reasons too long to explain, i settled for biomedical science for my bachelors.

ANYWAY

mid biomed bachelors degree i discovered how much i like atsronomy, i mean always found it interesting but i started heavily going thru videos n stuff, not too much physics but general concepts. almost made me think if i should drop out to pursue bachelors in astronomy, but nah i still liked human body stuff.

right now, post bachelors, i decided i would go thru an astronomy course by uni of arizona on coursera for fun, almost done and i honestly love it so so much. BUT neuroscience has always been a passion of mine, so i thought i would get a masters in that then maybe work in space medicine, do research in brain in space kinda stuff.

with biomed degree (took a neuroscience elective with it) i still have that knowledge under my belt. so i thought if i study astrobio now (i also like this whole life on other planets thing) i could study that, either work in that eventually if i end up liking it more or go back for the my whole medicine x space idea with both biomed n' astrobio under my belt.

i have been accepted in msc neuroscience and msc astrobiology, hence why i feel so indecisive now. i just want advice from somebody familiar with astrobiology. wont lie, study neuro and trying to participate in a brain x space research feel like the easier and safe option, but cant i still do that with a msc in astrobio?

News story with video of meteorite striking Earth

Could an extremophile microorganism survive what is recorded here?

In 2019, the lunar lander Beresheet crashed on the moon's surface with a payload of tardigrades. If extraterrestrial life is "life that may exist or has existed in the universe outside of Earth"(https://www.britannica.com/science/extraterrestrial-life), and if those tardigrades are alive, then do they count as extraterrestrial life?

Because the ice shell blocks all light to the underlying ocean, life would be totally reliant on chemical energy (assuming life has a hard time figuring out photosynthesis in ice). If the planet cools and becomes geologically inactive, wouldn't life be cut off from all sources of energy supply? Even if it still has an ocean, life could just be floating in it lifeless. Looking at a place like Europa, would it still have hydrothermal vents 4.5 billion years into its lifetime? Considering that it is about the size of Mars, which is also geologically inactive. And also about Mars, could we say any potential life on it would be dormant, with no chemical energy?

The Parker Solar Probe recently survived its closest flyby of the Sun at only 0.04 AU.

This gives confidence that the proposal to achieve high speed of a solar sail using a close flyby of the Sun using the ultralight, but high temperature material aerographite can work:

Interstellar Sails: A New Analysis of Aerographite by Paul Gilster | Sep 27, 2023 | Sail Concepts | https://www.centauri-dreams.org/2023/09/27/interstellar-sails-a-new-analysis-of-aerographite

Such a solar sail could reach a speed of 2%c, 6,000 km/s, using this close flyby. At this speed it could reach the solar gravitational lens(SGL) at 550 AU in only 6 months, and ‘Oumuamua in only 11 days(!)

The implications are stunning. Aerographite is an existing material. Then this means we currently have this capability.

Telescopes placed at the solar gravitational lens(SGL) would have the ability to amplify the images of an Earth-sized exoplanet by 100 billion times. It could resolve continent-sized features on such a planet.

‘Oumuamua is an interstellar object passing through our Solar System whose unusual motions led some to speculate it could be of artificial origin.

Then we now have the capability to directly observe Earth-sized exoplanets in other star systems and to determine features on an interstellar object from another star system which may have been artificially produced.

It seems like life, even the simplest alien life, will need some method of encoding information. I'm curious, though, what if we discover that alien life uses the same general structure of DNA? Would that be weirder than if it didn't?

Would they potentially have something like viruses, but not using the same coding system? How weird would it be if all alien life in the Universe had the same basic genetic structure?

Hi! I currently study biochemistry at a Canadian university and while I love the program, I have been really interested in astrobiology recently. This is new, uncharted territory for me and I was wondering where I could start out when it comes to learning more about all things astrobiology! Any help is greatly appreciated :)