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The Engineering and Mission Operations Directorates at NASA Johnson Space Center are combining laboratories and expertise to establish the Human Centered Autonomous and Assistant Systems Testbed for Exploration Operations. This is a testbed for human centered design, development and evaluation of intelligent autonomous and assistant systems that will be needed for human exploration and development of space. This project will improve human-centered analysis, design and evaluation methods for developing intelligent software. This software will support human-machine cognitive and collaborative activities in future interplanetary work environments where distributed computer and human agents cooperate. We are developing and evaluating prototype intelligent systems for distributed multi-agent mixed-initiative operations. The primary target domain is control of life support systems in a planetary base. Technical approaches will be evaluated for use during extended manned tests in the target domain, the Bioregenerative Advanced Life Support Systems Test Complex (BIO-Plex). A spinoff target domain is the International Space Station (ISS) Mission Control Center (MCC). Prodl}cts of this project include human-centered intelligent software technology, innovative human interface designs, and human-centered software development processes, methods and products. The testbed uses adjustable autonomy software and life support systems simulation models from the Adjustable Autonomy Testbed, to represent operations on the remote planet. Ground operations prototypes and concepts will be evaluated in the Exploration Planning and Operations Center (ExPOC) and Jupiter Facility.
A prototype micro-scale Fluorescent Activated Cell Sorter (microFACS) for life detection has been built and is undergoing testing. A functional miniature microfluidics instrument with the ability to remotely distinguish live or dead bacterial cells from abiotic particulates in ice or permafrost of icy bodies of the solar system would be of fundamental value to NASA. The use of molecular probes to obtain the bio-signature of living or dead cells could answer the most fundamental question of Astrobiology: Does life exist beyond Earth? The live-dead fluorescent stains to be used in the microFACS instrument function only with biological cell walls. The detection of the cell membranes of living or dead bacteria (unlike PAH's and many other Biomarkers) would provide convincing evidence of present or past life. This miniature device rapidly examine large numbers of particulates from a polar ice or permafrost sample and distinguish living from dead bacteria cells and biological cells from mineral grains and abiotic particulates and sort the cells and particulates based on a staining system. Any sample found to exhibit fluorescence consistent with living cells could then be used in conjunction with a chiral labeled release experiment or video microscopy system to seek addition evidence for cellular metabolism or motility. Results of preliminary testing and calibration of the microFACS prototype instrument system with pure cultures and enrichment assemblages of microbial extremophiles will be reported.
Automated life-detection experiments for solar system exploration have been previously. proposed and used onboard the. Viking, Mars lander,s, although. with ambiguous results. The recent advances in biotechnology such as biosensors, protein microarrays, and microfluidics alongside increased. knowledge in biomarker science have led to vastly improved sophistication and sensitivity for a new approach in life detection. The MASSE project has taken the challenge of integrating all of this knowledge into a new generation of interplanetary flight instrumentation for the main purpose.ot combining several mutually. confirming tests for life, organic/microbial contamination, prebiotic and abiotic chemicals into a small low powered instrument. Although the primary goal is interplanetary exploration, several terrestrial applications have become apparent specifically in point-of-care medical technology, bio-warfare, environmental sensing and microbial monitoring of manned space-flight vehicles.
Homochirality of the biomolecules (D-sugars of DNA and RNA and L-amino acids of proteins) is a fundamental property of all life on Earth. Abiotic mechanisms yield racemic mixtures (D/L=1) of chiral molecules and after the death of an organism, the enantiopure chiral biomolecules slowly racemize. Several independent investigators have now established that the amino acids present in CI1 and CM2 carbonaceous meteorites have a moderate to strong excess of the L-enantiomer. Stable isotope data have established that these amino acids are both indigenous and extraterrestrial. Carbonaceous meteorites also contain many other strong chemical biomarkers including purines and pyrimidines (nitrogen heterocycles of nucleic acids); pristine and phytane (components of the chlorophyll pigment) and morphological biomarkers (microfossils of filamentous cyanobacteria). Energy dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy (EDS) analysis reveals that nitrogen is below the detectability level in most of the meteorite filaments as well as in Cambrian Trilobites and filaments of 2.7 Gya Archaean cyanobacteria from Karelia. The deficiency of nitrogen in the filaments and the total absence of sugars, of twelve of the life-critical protein amino acids, and two of the nucleobases of DNA and RNA provide clear and convincing evidence that these filaments are not modern biological contaminants. This paper reviews the chiral, chemical biomarkers morphological biomarkers and microfossils in carbonaceous meteorites. This paper reviews chiral and morphological biomarkers and discusses the missing nitrogen, sugars, protein amino acids, and nucleobases as ?bio-discriminators? that exclude modern biological contaminants as a possible explanation for the permineralized cyanobacterial filaments found in the meteorites.
Topics include: a technology focus on data acquisition, electronic components and systems, software, materials, mechanics, machinery/automation, bio-medical, physical sciences, book and reports, and a special section of Photonics Tech Briefs.
Topics include: a technology focus sensors, software, electronic components and systems, materials, mechanics, machinery/automation, manufacturing, bio-medical, physical sciences, information sciences, book and reports, and a special section of Photonics Tech Briefs.
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Topics include: special coverage section on data acquisition and sensors and sections on electronic components and systems, software, materials, mechanics, machinery/automation, manufacturing/fabrication, bio-medical, physical sciences, information sciences, book and reports, and special section of Electronics Tech Briefs and Motion Control Tech briefs
Topics include: special coverage section on sensors, and sections on electronic components systems, software, materials, machinery/automation, manufacturing/fabrication, bio-medical, book and reports, and a special section of Photonics Tech Briefs.
The combination of evolutionary with engineering principles will enhance synthetic biology. Conversely, synthetic biology has the potential to enrich evolutionary biology by explaining why some adaptive space is empty, on Earth or elsewhere. Synthetic biology, the design and construction of artificial biological systems, substitutes bio-engineering for evolution, which is seen as an obstacle. But because evolution has produced the complexity and diversity of life, it provides a proven toolkit of genetic materials and principles available to synthetic biology. Evolution operates on the population level, with the populations composed of unique individuals that are historical entities. The source of genetic novelty includes mutation, gene regulation, sex, symbiosis, and interspecies gene transfer. At a phenotypic level, variation derives from regulatory control, replication and diversification of components, compartmentalization, sexual selection and speciation, among others. Variation is limited by physical constraints such as diffusion, and chemical constraints such as reaction rates and membrane fluidity. While some of these tools of evolution are currently in use in synthetic biology, all ought to be examined for utility. A hybrid approach of synthetic biology coupled with fine-tuning through evolution is suggested