First Contact (29 page)

Michael Mumma of Goddard Space Flight Center not only explained the complex world of spectroscopy and how he and his colleagues detected methane on Mars, but he also helped secure an invitation for me to meet him at the European Southern Observatory at Paranal, Chile. He and his colleague, Geronimo Villanueva, allowed me to join them for two nights of observing, which was both fascinating and illuminating. Laura Ventura of the ESO also helped instruct me on some of the mechanics of the telescope and astrophysics of the work. Edward Weiler of NASA described the importance of Mumma's work in reaching an agreement with the European Space Agency for two joint missions to Mars. For the section on additional research into possible life on Mars, I relied on interviews with Paul Mahaffy of NASA's Goddard Space Center, Steven Squyres of Cornell University, and the rich literature on the long-ago presence of water on the Martian surface, the former presence of a magnetic field, and the mineralogy of the planet. Most important, I learned firsthand from NASA's Pan Conrad at Death Valley, the Mojave Desert, and White Mountain Peak about how to analyze habitats in extreme areas. As a member of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory science team, which will analyze Mars for organic material and habitats potentially suitable for life, she gave me insights into how the mission will unfold. In addition, numerous presentations at the Astrobiology Science Conference of 2010 in League City, Texas, about the Martian past helped inform my reporting.

In navigating the difficult shoals of the controversies about published research asserting that extraterrestrial life had been detected in Martian and other meteorites and by the Viking Mars lander in 1976, I spent substantial time with Richard Hoover of NASA's Marshall Space Center, David McKay of NASA's Johnson Space Center, and Gil Levin. All three explained in great detail how and why they are convinced they did discover extraterrestrial life. Contrary views were provided by Andrew Steele of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, NASA's Mary Voytek and Michael Meyer, Allan Treiman
of the Lunar and Planetary Institute, and Rafael Navarro-González. Kathy Sawyer's
The Rock from Mars
gave deeply reported and highly respected insights into the ALH 84001 Martian meteorite debate, and Henry Cooper's
The Search for Life on Mars
did the same for the Viking Labeled Release controversy. Presentations at the 2010 Astrobiology Science Conference (AbSciCon) by Kathie Thomas-Keprta and Everett K. Gibson helped explain the current status of research on the famous meteorite.

The science of planet-hunting was illuminated and made fascinating primarily by Paul Butler, who invited me to spend time with him at the Anglo-Australian Observatory in Coonabarabran, Australia. His patient descriptions of the complex science helped me enormously. The paper published by Butler and Steve Vogt of the University of California at Santa Cruz on the discovery of the first exoplanet in a “habitable zone” provided the exclamation point at the end of the planet-hunting sentence. The literature on exoplanet discoveries is also rich, and I found James Kasting's
How to Find a Habitable Planet
to be useful. Webster Cash of the University of Colorado, Boulder, and Remi Soummer of the Space Telescope Institute in Baltimore explained the science of occulters after I was first introduced to it by Sara Seager. The complex history of NASA's efforts to develop a Terrestrial Planet Finder mission, which would explore for potentially habitable planets, was the subject of several presentations at AbSciCon 2010 as well.

My introduction to the issue of the “fine-tuning” of the universe occurred at Cambridge University, and came from Lord Martin Rees, history of science professor and minister Fraser Watts, and former physics professor and minister John Polkinghorne. Theoretical cosmologist Paul Davies of Arizona State University helped me in numerous ways in both interviews and his several books on the subject. Lee Smolin of the Perimeter Institute of Theoretical Physics taught me about cosmic natural selection, as did Louis Crane of Kansas State University. George Ellis of the University of Cape Town provided a religious interpretation of fine-tuning.

On the subject of the shadow biosphere and arsenic-based life in Mono
Lake, I relied on information from NASA Astrobiology Institute fellow Felisa Wolfe-Simon, her colleague at the U.S. Geological Survey, Ron Oremland, Mary Voytek and microbiologist Rosie Redfield at the University of British Columbia. Reporting by Carl Zimmer in
Slate
and Dennis Overbye at
The New York Times
was also informative. In addition, I was initially introduced to the subject of the possible shadow biosphere by Paul Davies and Carol Cleland, who both shared insights into their pioneering thinking.

The literature on SETI is extensive, but firsthand reporting is not. That is why I traveled to both the Allen Array at Hat Creek, California, to see the new SETI radio telescopes, and to the Nishi-Harima Observatory in western Japan to witness a nationwide SETI observation organized by observatory director Shin-ya Narusawa, who provided much-appreciated information and insight. Frank Drake, Jill Tarter, and Douglas Vakoch of the SETI Institute spoke with me at length about current SETI projects and history. Rick Forester is the chief scientist at Hat Creek, and he also provided invaluable information. I was introduced to the controversial and fascinating subject of “active SETI” by Vakoch and listened to several presentations about it at the AbSciCon 2010 gathering.

The history of the extraterrestrial debate, and especially its religious ramifications, is well documented by NASA's Steven Dick and the University of Notre Dame's Michael Crowe. I am indebted to Father José Gabriel Funes, director of the Vatican Observatory, for his help regarding the 2009 Vatican conference on astrobiology, and to Notre Dame University professor Ingrid Rowland for her work on the martyred Giordano Bruno. Fraser Watts of Cambridge University also helped put issues in perspective. Margaret Race of SETI organized the NASA-sponsored 2009 conference on the implications of astrobiology, and I appreciate her willingness to have me participate and share much information. My final conclusions in
chapter 10
were largely the result of my own thinking, but they were helped by discussions with Carol Cleland, Geoffrey Marcy, Paul Davies, Ed Weiler, and Sara Seager, as well as reading the works of Peter Ward, Alan Boss, and Martin Rees.

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