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Origins Center – Startimpuls and beyond Frank Helmich – chairman Route 4 NWA (Het ontstaan van het leven: op aarde en in het heelal)/Origins Center Origins Center • • • Origins Center is the outcome of the Route 4 discussions of 2016 It is a virtual Center with science around Origins and Evolution questions Main topics for interdisciplinary research are 5 “gamechangers” 1) Reconstruct the origin of the Earth and life 2) Predict the evolution of life 3) Build and steer life from molecule to biosphere 4) Find life outside of the Earth 5) Bridge large temporal and spatial scales, (crucial for the first four game changers) • • How to shape the center and how to arrange the governance? -> design study How to build a sustainable community that profits from new possibilities in the NWA? -> workshops as a start 4 How to build a community? • • • • Our community consists of molecular biosciences, biophysics, ecology, chemistry, earth sciences, mathematics, computer science and astronomy Involvement of Universities of Groningen, Twente, Nijmegen, Utrecht, Amsterdam (VU & UvA), Leiden, Wageningen, Delft, Eindhoven, Rotterdam. NWO/KNAW/other institutes: NIOO, NIOZ, Naturalis, CWI, SRON, AMOLF, NKI All in all 700(?) tenured scientists How to exploit the strengths and assets we can bring to bear on the five challenges: • Strong groups in all relevant disciplines • Proximity – distances in NL are small • Existing networks and programmes (building blocks of life, planetary & exoplanetary science, .....) • Specific strengths related to (big) research infrastructure and instruments (which ones?) • Society taking an interest in the research problems that we have adopted 5 Startimpuls • Ministry of OCW has put aside between 6 and 7M€ for Theme 3: Hoe kan natuurwetenschappelijke kennis bijdragen aan vernieuwing? Three Routes can apply for this money: Route 4, Route 5 on fundamentals of time and space and the route on Quantum/nano-revolution • Before end of April the core group will have to come up with a proposal of approximately 2.5 M€, to be spent within 3 years. This is very little money for so many scientists, but it makes further development of the Center possible. • Originally we thought that the workshops were too late to provide input. But since the call is late, we value your input. Deadline for the proposal is June 15. • What can be in the proposal? Postdocs, PhD students, fieldlabs, conferences and workshops. Workvisits in NL from Dutch and external scientists etc. etc. 6 Today • The overall aim of the workshop is to produce clear research objectives for this gamechanger and a long-term plan to achieve these objectives that is scalable to the available money. • The workshop is set up to enable a bottom up process, first to explore the foremost areas of research to advance this gamechanger (morning), then to synthesize these ideas into about four research questions, which are widely recognized as key questions (early afternoon), and finally to prioritize these questions scalable to available time and resources (late afternoon). • We need to identify the links between the disciplines where research should be done and strengthen existing ones and build up new ones 7 Fundamentals of Life in the Universum • • • August 31 and September 1 in Groningen http://www.origins-symposium.nl Send it to your Dutch and foreign colleagues! 8 Ignas Snellen, Leiden Observatory, Leiden University Rocky planets around nearby low-mass stars, which may have similar climates as Earth August 2016 February 2017 O2 à Atmospheric characterization [Funding sources: VICI; ERC-S; ERC-A; NWO-PEPSci / TOP, NOVA] à Instrumentation – JWST/E-ELT [MIRI –JWST (co-I), METIS/E-ELT (PI)] à Technology development – coronagraphy/adaptive optics [EPICS/E-ELT (PI?) – KNAW roadmap; NOVA, ERC-S] JWST (2018) E-ELT (2024) Bert Vermeersen, Aerospace Engineering, TU Delft Source:ESA,JUICEYellow Book How habitable was and is Mars? • • • • Radiation Water Atmosphere Geochemistry • water history: pH, salinity • CHNOPS • atmosphere history MSL ExoMars Future technologies • Drilling into the subsurface • Cave research • Life Marker Chips Most likely the ocean in Jupiter’s moon Europa alone already contains more water than Earth’s oceans ………. (Sources NASA/JPL [Galileo] & ESA JUICE Yellow Book) • Search for Extinct vs. Existing Life and Habitats? What to look for? • Are there any unique signatures for extraterrestrial life? Unique biomarkers? • Or only from circumstantial combinations of scientific disciplines and observations? • Are the four elements water / elements / energy / stability enough for life to form and evolve? (ionizing radiation? magnetic fields? ….?) • Is life on Earth characteristic for extraterrestrial life forms? • How to recognise / deal with temporal evolution of habitats? • How does life influence its habitat and surroundings, and vice versa? (e.g., atmospheres for surface habitats / impurities on surface ice for deep habitats) Paul Mason, Earth Sciences, Utrecht University - When did life begin on Earth? - How rapidly did the terrestrial (microbial) biosphere evolve? - Did geological constraints prevent more rapid biological evolution? - Can we develop more robust biosignatures for distant (exo)planets? - How do we interpret planetary atmospheres? - Can we identify the geology of distant (exo)planets? WhatisthecurrentconsensusfortheappearanceoflifeonEarth? +++convincing++presumptive+permissive Complex Life OxygenationoftheOceans 1.9 +++ +++ +++ Earth Evolution(?) Oxygenationoftheatmosphere ++ 2.7 +++(C,S,N) 3.5 ++(C,S) ++ 3.8 +(C) ++ 4.2 +(C) Stable Isotopes ++/+++ Molecular Biomarkers Microfossils/ Stromatolites Prokaryote Evolution Originof Life Anoxia Firstmicrobialbiosphere OxicsurfaceEarth Richandcomplexbiology Lyons&Reinhoud,Nature,2009 Lyonsetal.,Nature, 2015 Tools for tracing life in rocks/ atmospheres: - More definitive biosignatures terrestrial & astrobiological - Conceptual, laboratory and field testing - Better links to missions/ spectroscopy - Limits of life: Extremophiles - Life/planet interactions - Preservation of biosignatures - Abiotic baseline testing Planetary Terrestrial - Origin of life - Boundary conditions for life - Evolutionary timescales - Biosignature calibration - Terrestrial analogues (Micro)biology Chemistry Astronomy Planetary Science Geosciences Field studies Computational sciences Laboratory studies Physics Lucas Patty, VU & Jan de Leeuw, NIOZ Top down approach: Life as we know it Minimal life as we expect it Self-replicating systems (eg RNA,PNA) Primordial organic molecules Life as we don’t know it If we want to search for life beyond Earth, we first have to understand life on Earth: it wasn’t until the introduction of molecular ecology that biologists discovered a lot of extreme environments were not sterile.. If we can’t find life as we know it right in front of us, how can we find life that is unfamiliar? Kawah Ijen,Indonesian Crater Lake, pH 0.2, Temp. 30-55oC P/T/pH boundaries for terrestrial life (Harrison 2013) Possible variations on DNA, using different sugars, backbones and bases (Pinheiro & Holliger 2012) In a more distant feature, reflectance spectra might be taken of distant worlds, containing a direct signatures of surface life: the so called ‘red edge’, which is pigment dependent. Bacterial reflectance, (Hegde 2015) Koninklijk Royal Netherlands Nederlands Institute Instituut for Sea voorResearch Zeeonderzoek The origin of life, on Earth and Elsewhere Jan W. de Leeuw - NIOZ Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Texel NL - Utrecht University, Utrecht NL NIOZ is an institute of in cooperation with 30 Conditions for life on Earth and other Goldilocks planets 1) A continuous supply of reactive carbon for synthesizing new organics; 2) A supply of free energy to drive metabolic biochemistry – the formation of new proteins, DNA, and so on; 3) Catalysts to speed up and channel these metabolic reactions; 4) Excretion of waste, to pay the debt to the second law of thermodynamics and drive chemical reactions in the correct direction; 5) Compartmentalisation – a cell-like structure that separates the inside from the outside; 6) Hereditary material – RNA, DNA or an equivalent, to specify the detailed form and function. Nick Lane in: ‘The vital question’, W.W. Norton & Company (2015) 31 Animals FPE First Eukaryote Bacteria Archaea LUCA Chemical Evolution ?? viruses?? a.o. sugars, peptides, RNA, lipids Polymerization a.o. ribose, amino acids, CO, CH4, pyruvate, acetylphosphate (“ATP”) N2, H2S Fe-, Ni-, Mo-sulfides 1) formose reaction, 2) “abiotic” Wood-Ljungdal pathway CH2O Strong pH gradient CO2 3 Fe2Si04 + 2 Mg2SiO4 + 5H2O à 2 H2 + 2 Fe3O4 + 3 SiO2 + Mg(OH)2 + Mg3Si2O5 olivine magnetite Big Bang brucite serpentinite Anoxic Hydrothermal Vents Biological Evolution Ocean, Continents The super tree of life Algae, plants CO2 + H2 “spontaneous” CH2O in HTV-chimneys 33 Herschy et.al J. Mol. Evol. 79:213-227 (2014) Catalytic surfaces in HTV-chimney ‘cells’ Co-factor Ferredoxin HTV minerals CO-dehydrogenase/ acetyl synthase 34 Michael Russell, American Scientist, 94: 32-39 (2006) Animals FPE First Eukaryote Bacteria Archaea LUCA Chemical Evolution ?? viruses?? a.o. sugars, peptides, RNA, lipids Polymerization a.o. ribose, amino acids, CO, CH4, pyruvate, acetylphosphate (“ATP”) N2, H2S Fe-, Ni-, Mo-sulfides 1) formose reaction, 2) “abiotic” Wood-Ljungdal pathway CH2O Strong pH gradient CO2 3 Fe2Si04 + 2 Mg2SiO4 + 5H2O à 2 H2 + 2 Fe3O4 + 3 SiO2 + Mg(OH)2 + Mg3Si2O5 olivine magnetite Big Bang brucite serpentinite Anoxic Hydrothermal Vents Biological Evolution Ocean, Continents The super tree of life Algae, plants Big Bang Door NASA/WMAP Science Team http://map.gsfc.nasa .gov/media/060915/i ndex.html 36 Genetic reconstruction of LUCA 6.1 x 106 genes 355 protein families present in both bacteria and archaea phyla LUCA: Anaerobic, CO2fixing, WLpathway, N2-fixing, à la Clostridia (bacteria) and methanogens (archaea) In Hydrothermal vents Weiss et. al, Nature Microbiology 2016.116 37 definition of questions and themes • long-term overarching themes (what is the big question) • what are the first steps (achievable within StartImpuls and other short term funding) • what are longer term goals POST-ITS!