Last week, one of the main critics of a NASA-funded study that claimed the discovery of a life-form that could thrive on arsenic, announced results that contradict the original conclusions, dealing the latest blow to the controversial finding.

In December 2010, a team led by NASA astrobiology research fellow Felisa Wolfe-Simon announced that a microbe dubbed GFAJ-1 could thrive in the presence of arsenic, incorporating the toxic substance in its DNA in the place of phosphorous, one of the six elements of life. The results were made public in a NASA press conference that drew attention to the finding’s implications on the agency’s quest for life in other parts of the universe.

Yet many scientists were not convinced. Ensuing debate prompted sharp criticisms, several of which were published in Science as technical comments along with the print version of the article on June 3, 2011. Many of the comments centered on a concern that phosphorous contamination could account for the bacteria’s growth – not the level of arsenic.

This is what Rosemary Redfield, a microbiologist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, set out to investigate.

In a posting last week on arxiv.org, an electronic preprint archive, Redfield announced her results after looking at the two main arguments of the paper: that the bacterium had managed to grow in low phosphorous and high arsenic conditions, and that arsenic had been incorporated into the organism’s DNA.  Consistent with criticisms faulting contamination in the original study, Redfield found that the bacterium’s growth could be accounted for as a result of trace levels of phosphorous. Measuring samples with and without added arsenic, but with the same level of phosphorous, Redfield found growth rates equivalent to those described in the original study.

A collaboration with Leonid Kruglyak from Princeton University allowed Redfield to analyze the bacterium’s DNA in high-arsenic conditions. “The results showed that there is no detectable arsenic in the DNA,” she told CBS News.  Although this suggests that more sensitive measurements could potentially detect the presence of arsenic, Redfield’s first result counters the original study’s main claim: that the bacterium could grow on arsenic alone.

In a ScienceInsider article covering the story, Redfield says: “We can do fancier analyses that push the limits of detection down, but I think the burden of proof is back on the authors. They are going to have to provide some better data than they did in their paper,” she said.

ScienceInsider reported that Wolfe-Simon and her colleagues declined to comment on the new study until it is published. They added, however, that they only suggested arsenic was in the DNA and that the key point of the paper was that the microbe was able to use the toxin to grow. The article quotes John Tainer, a biochemist who recently joined Wolfe-Simon’s team, in saying: “What this is about is refuting an extreme interpretation of the paper.” This is a shift in the team’s original position, as discussed in the 2010 press conference, that when measuring the arsenic concentration in the organism, they found it to be behaving as phosphorous would: as the backbone of the DNA.

Redfield has submitted her findings to Science for publication.

A SpacePolicyOnline.com summary of last Friday’s hearing on NOAA’s Joint Polar Satellite System is now available. It can be download by clicking here or from our left menu under “Our Hearing Summaries.” The hearing was held by two subcommittees of the House Science, Space and Technology Committee with witnesses from NOAA, NASA and GAO.

A year and a half after the Obama Administration’s disbandment of the tri-agency NPOESS weather satellite program into separate civil and military systems, the problems of future U.S. polar orbiting weather satellites are far from over. A political majority in the House that is skeptical of climate change and likely funding constraints have been added to the mix of issues that remain as NOAA (with NASA as its acquisition agent) and DOD go their own ways.

At yesterday’s joint hearing of the Oversight and Investigations (O&I) and Energy and Environment (E&E) Subcommittees of the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, the few members in attendance seemed to agree on one thing: NOAA’s Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) program must succeed. O&I Chairman Paul Broun (R-GA) called for full funding of the program after saying that “every American is impacted by this program, whether they know it or not.”

E&E Chairman Andy Harris (R-MD) and O&I Ranking Member Brad Miller (D-NC) agreed that “this is a project that needs to succeed.” The two disagreed, however, on the most critical issues facing JPSS. Although JPSS and its DOD cousin, the Defense Weather Satellite System (DWSS), may be on surer footing than when the agencies were jointly trying to build NPOESS, funding shortfalls and a lack of defined baseline programs continue to be problems. (The Senate Appropriations Committee recently voted to kill the DWSS program and directed DOD to start all over again in defining its requirements.)

Miller identified the most critical issue for JPSS as the likely gap in coverage during the 2016-2017 time frame brought on by the “remarkably shortsighted” decision of congressional appropriators to not fully fund the program in FY2011. The “appropriations shortfall has ensured that a gap will happen,” he said. NOAA officials have warned Congress repeatedly that because it has only approximately half of the funding it needed in FY2011, there is a high probability of a gap in coverage when its existing satellites stop working before the first JPSS is launched.

Chairman Harris, however, was more concerned about the rising cost of the program in light of current budgetary constraints: “The most critical issue facing our nation today is out-of-control spending by the federal government.” He likened the JPSS satellites to new cars and asked Dr. Kathryn Sullivan, Deputy Administrator of NOAA, whether leaving out the “bells and whistles” — in his analogy, the long range climate sensors – would bring the program back to cost and schedule. When Dr. Sullivan responded that the climate sensors had indeed already been removed in a previous reworking of JPSS, Harris said enthusiastically: “Good for you!”

Chairman Harris later questioned Dr. Sullivan about contingency plans in the event of a coverage gap and chastised her for the “glaring omission” in her testimony of not describing NOAA’s efforts to discuss options for obtaining weather data from private sector companies. Dr. Sullivan responded that NOAA has released several requests for information (RFI) to private companies on this issue, and has ongoing efforts to obtain data from other countries as part of its contingency efforts.

Measures to secure continuity of coverage in the event of a gap must be seriously explored, warned O&I Chairman Broun. He said he “very firmly” believes with “high certainty” that Congress will fund the government through Continuing Resolutions instead of regular appropriations bills for the remainder of the Congress. This, he said, would be a “huge” problem for the already schedule- and budget-constrained program.

A SpacePolicyOnline.com hearing summary will be available soon. A webcast of the hearing and press releases from the Republicans and Democrats on the committee are available on their respective sites.

At last week’s NASA Future Forum, better and clearer communication about agency activities and policies was the order of the day.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA’s) scientific and technological research, and its contributions not only to its missions, but to the U.S. economy and the lives of its citizens, was the focus of the NASA Future Forum, held at the University of Maryland, College Park. Participants, audience members and online viewers interacting via Twitter, engaged in discussions about how best to involve companies and universities in NASA-funded research, how to take successful technologies and integrate them into the market as spinoffs, and how to measure the value of investments, among other things.

Yet one theme that underlined many of the day’s discussions centered on the agency’s efforts to communicate with the public about these activities. Officials also attempted to “correct” what perceptions may have been created from the policy battles being waged just a few miles away in the nation’s capital.

One of these latter points was taken up by NASA Administrator Charles Bolden. When he asked the audience who believed it would take years to know when a U.S. vehicle would be arriving at the International Space Station (ISS), the majority shot up their hands. Bolden said that, in fact, it would take less time for American vehicles to fly to the ISS than it took for the post-Columbia disaster recovery (about two-and-a-half years). In response to the audience’s reaction, he explained that he and NASA had failed to send out the right message and that it could be as early as next year for a U.S. company to be delivering cargo (but not crew) to the ISS.

Dr. Laurie Leshin, Deputy Associate Administrator for Exploration at NASA Headquarters, alluded to another policy battle when she began her remarks by stating that “reports of our death have been greatly exaggerated.” Leshin spoke with enthusiasm about what she described as “the next phase of human exploration” and the scientific endeavors that would take the human spaceflight program to new destinations. Once again she aimed to correct an incorrect message; “there is a great program,” she declared, speaking to those who, according to her, are saying that the agency no longer has a space exploration program. Leshin recently announced that she would be leaving NASA for the Rennselaer Institute of Technology.

Policy debates aside, perhaps the biggest issue was the question of whether the day’s overall message – NASA’s direct and indirect contribution to society through science and technology – was reaching its audience at all. Bolden said that at NASA, “we take science fiction and turn it into science fact.” Still, his lamentation that so few young people were in attendance begged the question of just how many of them are aware or interested in this side of the agency’s activities.

Dr. Raymond Sedwick, an engineering professor at the University of Maryland, posed this very question. During the NASA panel, which included Dr. Robert Braun, NASA Chief Technologist, and Dr. Waleed Abdalati, NASA’s Chief Scientist, Sedwick asked whether they were not really “preaching to the choir.” Sedwick argued that the audience was made up of people who were already informed and excited about NASA’s activities and that the agency’s problem was one of public relations. He challenged NASA to be more creative in how it delivers its messages, arguing that it should seek to excite not just children and students, but the adult public as well.

Braun, who in his comments had argued that NASA was “improving life everyday here on Earth,” admitted that before being part of the agency, he did not know about NASA activities in this area. As a member of the public, the message just never reached him. Braun said though that in his current role he had assumed the task of communicating more about spinoffs and that his office, which produces an annual spinoff report, would emphasize societal benefits in the near future, because “NASA has a great story to tell.”

Representative Donna Edwards (D-MD), who offered some brief remarks later in the morning, agreed: “We have to tell those stories.” Edwards argued that the space community’s challenge is making the result of NASA’s investments in science and technology better known to the general public.

“A nation is only as strong as its investments in technology in the future,” said Edwards, adding that “the core” of those activities was the work done at NASA. If these discussions are any indication, though, it seems that NASA’s science and technology investments need to be paired with a better strategy for communicating the policies that guide them and what they mean for the community outside of the agency’s walls.

Researchers wanting to focus on the origin-of-life question now have the opportunity to compete for up to $2 million in research funding. But there is a twist: proposals must not include the intervention of an intelligent creator. For Harry Lonsdale, the millionaire chemist offering the award, the research should help prove — once and for all — that life is solely the result of physical and chemical processes.

According to AAAS’s Scienceinsider, the award is driven by Lonsdale’s belief that “the creation of life was probably not an act of God. It was just nature running its course.” Lonsdale argues that science has achieved progress toward answering this question and that an answer will soon be available: “The answer will be: God didn’t do it, nature did it.”

Lonsdale’s website announcing the award details strict guidelines for proposals to consider the question of how life originated on prebiotic Earth, encouraging participants to “offer unconventional hypotheses that nonetheless can be subject to experimental validation.” This includes a definition of life itself: “‘Life’ is defined here as a self-sustained chemical system capable of undergoing Darwinian evolution.”

Including a definition is a surprise in itself. NASA’s Astrobiology program, which adopts an interdisciplinary research approach to consider many of these questions in its quest for life elsewhere, is careful not to provide a definition of life. With discoveries such as extreme life questioning old assumptions about what life is supposed to be, researchers may not want to exclude extraordinary, yet scientifically sound, propositions. Still, there may be a synergy between the two initiatives as one of the experts helping evaluating submissions, according to ScienceInsider, is NASA Astrobiologist Chris McKay.

Lonsdale states on his website that “A solution will give every science teacher in the world, from high school to college, a fundamental understanding of how life probably began on the Earth.” It may be safe to add that new findings may also impact NASA activities and our understanding of where life may exist beyond our own planet.

Heated debate over “arsenic life” that began five months ago (see our story) continues this week with the formal publication of the team’s findings in the journal Science (subscription required). The debate began after a team of scientists announced discovery of a life-form that seemed to dispute one of the fundamental truths of life — a microbe that could thrive on arsenic.

Last December, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) research fellow Felisa Wolfe-Simon and her team published results of an experiment involving a microbe found in Mono Lake in Northern California. When placed into conditions lacking phosphorous – one of the building blocks of life – and rich in arsenic, the organism, dubbed GFAJ-1, was able to replace the necessary element with the chemically similar, yet ordinarily toxic, one and live, they claimed. NASA hinted at the finding in a press release preceding the press conference that announced a finding that would have implications for astrobiology — the search for life elsewhere in the universe. Although the discovery is here on Earth, the implications of the finding question the most basic assumptions of life and offers new considerations for NASA’s astrobiology program.

Even when the announcement was made, other scientists were wary of giving too much weight to this one experiment. Steven Benner, Distinguished Fellow at the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution, who participated in NASA’s December press conference, warned that chemists would need “exceptional evidence” to support the findings and described it as an “exceptional claim.”

The sentiment proved to be true not only for chemists, but for other scientists who were “sharply critical of the paper” as reported in Science’s blog, ScienceInsider, on Friday. Technical comments on the Wolfe-Simon team’s conclusions quoted by ScienceInsider show concerns over the possibility of phosphorous contamination when the arsenic-rich environment was created in the laboratory. Benner, a molecular biochemist, authored one of the Technical Comments and questioned the basic hypothesis of the research on the basis of the instability of the arsenic compound. “Their hypothesis…would, if true, set aside nearly a century of chemical data concerning arsenate and phosphate molecules,” he wrote.

The team’s initial reticence in December to respond to comments and its desire to have “that discourse in the scientific community” prompted many of the Technical Comments. ScienceInsider also summarizes the team’s response to the criticisms. The team stands by its initial results and points to its acknowledgement in the original paper that while trace amounts of phosphorous were detected in the experiment, these would not account for the bacterial growth measured.

The debate suggests that NASA astrobiologists, while keeping close watch of the research that comes out in the next couple of years over this issue, should perhaps not rush to hone in on arsenic-rich environments on other planets in the quest for life. Here on Earth at least, the question remains open.

To celebrate President John F. Kennedy’s so-called “moon speech” delivered to Congress 50 years ago, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) put together a concert, appropriately held at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. on May 25. Performances by the Space Philharmonic orchestra complemented a series of images and videos from NASA’s 50 years of human spaceflight missions that were set in motion by President Kennedy’s challenge.

With appearances by Jean Kennedy Smith, sister of President Kennedy, along with actresses Nichelle Nichols and June Lockhart (from the original Star Trek and Lost in Space television series respectively) and musician Herbie Hancock, the night was full of surprises. NASA images were paired with Beethoven, the Star Trek theme and even “Somewhere” from West Side Story.

Yet the event was not just a big party. A very special presentation by the Soldiers’ Chorus of the U.S. Army Field Band accompanied stills and videos from the tragic Apollo 1, Challenger and Columbia missions and the astronauts lost in these accidents. Astronauts Scott Altman and Leland Melvin, who introduced this segment, spoke soberly about the risk that is still involved in any human spaceflight mission. Even as we look toward the Space Shuttle’s last flight in the coming months, Altman reiterated that “the Shuttle remains an experimental vehicle,” one that will provide lessons for the next-generation vehicles to follow.

What those vehicles will look like and where they will take the next group of astronauts remain issues of contention. NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, who likened President Barack Obama to President Kennedy as another “young president” who identified and seeks to address a national need, said that “we stand at a Moon shot moment once again.”

This sense of hope about the future of the human spaceflight program — contrasting with the persisting uncertainty over what will come next for NASA – was not only reflected in the NASA leadership. Nichelle Nichols, who took part in recruiting the first women and minority astronauts that would reprise her television role in real life, said that “space is part of all of our lives.” She spoke with enthusiasm of what the Shuttle program meant for diversity, through which “women and people of color took to space for real.” She and others clearly have high hopes for much more to come — in a spontaneous response to a crying baby, Nichols turned toward the sound and said: “You’ll fly. You’ll fly next time!”