is the study of life in the universe and of the terrestrial environments and planetary and stellar processes that support it. To study astrobiology is to ask questions that cut across multiple disciplines and could take lifetimes to answer. The field gathers expertise from a host of other disciplines including biology, chemistry, geology, oceanography, atmospheric and Earth science, aeronautical engineering and of course astronomy itself.

These questions also include: What can Earth鈥檚 own species, and its chemical past, tell us about how to spot life elsewhere? How did the first cells arise? Can we map the surfaces of exoplanets? How can we motivate students to be curious about space?

Every two years, researchers gather from around the world to share and discuss their latest findings in a weeklong conference. Called for short, this year鈥檚 conference will be held June 24-28 at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Bellevue. It鈥檚 the biggest meeting of astrobiologists in the world and dozens of 天美影视传媒 researchers will attend and participate.

Public attitudes have warmed greatly toward astrobiology in the 21^st century, prompted by exoplanet discoveries and exploration of other worlds in the solar system. Study of extraterrestrial life remains a hopeful science wryly aware that, as an old joke goes, it has yet to prove that its very subject matter exists.

The UW founded its own program in 1999, involving roughly 30 faculty and about as many students a year. “The program is a leader in both training the next generation of astrobiologists and in fundamental astrobiology research,” said , UW professor of astronomy and principal investigator for the UW-based , which explores computer models of planetary environments and will be the subject of a .

“The Astrobiology Science Conference is the biggest meeting of astrobiologists in the world, and this year, members of the UW Astrobiology Program are playing a major role in conference organization, as well as presenting our research at the meeting,” said Meadows, who chaired the science committee for AcSciCon2019.

Here are several UW presentations and papers scheduled for the weeklong conference. Though the lead presenter is listed here only, most projects involve the work of several colleagues.

• A study of water vapor and ice particles emitting from the plume on Saturn’s moon Enceladus, leading to a better understanding of the moon’s subsurface ocean. With Earth and space sciences doctoral student and colleagues. ()
• An examination of whether the coming James Webb Space Telescope will be able to detect atmospheres for all worlds in the intriguing, seven-planet system TRAPPIST-1, and finding that clouds and water vapor in the planets’ atmospheres might make such study more challenging. With astronomy and astrobiology doctoral student and colleagues. ()
• Description of a new open-source computer software package called VPLanet that simulates a wide range of planetary systems across billions of years, simulating atmospheres, orbits and stellar phenomena that can affect a planet’s ability to sustain liquid water on its surface, which is key to life. With Rory Barnes and colleagues. ()
• An exploration of how viruses and hosts co-evolved, enabling microbial life in extremely cold brines. With oceanography professor ().
• Modeling Earth’s atmosphere 2.7 billion years ago and the effect of iron-rich micrometeorites that rained down, melted and interacted with the surrounding gases, leading to a better understanding of carbon dioxide levels at that time. With Earth and space sciences graduate student and colleagues. ()
• A presentation on the UW Astronomy Department’s successful outreach to students through its that visits K-12 schools, enabling them to create shows of their own. With astronomy research assistant professor and several colleagues. and .)
• An exploration of how to determine if oxygen detected on an exoplanet is really produced by life, using high-resolution planetary spectra from ground-based telescopes. With , an astronomy doctoral student, and colleagues. ()
• A discussion of how studying a giant Pacific Octopus might help us learn more about different forms of cognition and better know and understand life beyond Earth 鈥� if we ever find it. With , a doctoral student in psychology. ()
• A study of microbial life in extremely cold brines within unfrozen subsurface areas of permafrost, and their possible relevance to similar environments on Mars or icy moons in the solar system. With , a doctoral student in biological oceanography, and colleagues. (.)

Many other UW faculty members will participate, either with reports on their own research or in support of colleagues or graduate students. These include ESS professors , , , , , astronomy professors , and , among others.

Astrobiologists such as Sullivan point out that the field鈥檚 focus and scientific benefit is about more than simply hunting for life, though that is the key motivator.

“It鈥檚 about thinking about life in a cosmic context. And about the origin and evolution of life,” Sullivan said.

“Even if you only care about Earth life, astrobiology is a viable 鈥� fundamental, I would say 鈥� interdisciplinary science that thrives independently of the existence of extraterrestrial life.鈥�

More specifically, Sivitilli, a 天美影视传媒 doctoral student in behavioral neuroscience in the Department of Psychology, will explain the extraordinary way that octopuses gather information, and even make certain decisions, with their arms 鈥� and note the possible astrobiological benefit of learning about “the diversity of forms a mind can take.”

Sivitilli works with , UW assistant professor of psychology.

The nervous system of an octopus is very diffuse, Sivitilli said, and mostly located in the arms. “When I do my work I look at how the arms are acquiring information from the environment, and how they are collectively making decisions about that information. That’s where most of their nervous system is, and it allows them to process massive amounts of information in parallel.”

The octopus brain “offloads” some motor decisions to the arms, which are lined with suckers, each of which has tens of thousands of chemical and mechanical receptors, Sivitilli said.

Like other life forms such as ourselves, octopuses have evolved over billions of years. The last common ancestor we had with such creatures was 500 million years back 鈥� since then the two species have evolved in parallel but through “entirely different neural architecture.”

“Their way of thinking is fundamentally different,” Sivitilli said. “We are not asking, ‘How intelligent are they? We are asking, ‘How are they intelligent?”

Sivitilli is a scientific scuba diver. He first studied the smaller red octopus, and then came to the UW’s , a perfect place to study the behavior and cognition of much bigger Enteroctopus dofleini, or the giant Pacific octopus 鈥� the largest octopus species known.

In an essay titled “,” Sivitilli wrote of encountering “a large, camouflaged, breathing mass” 45 feet down in the water off San Juan County Park. This was a giant Octopus he and colleagues named and brought into the lab for study.

And as the days and nights passed in the darkened lab, the human and the octopus regarded each other with mutual interest and curiosity.

“Two cousins we are, meeting across an evolutionary divide of over 500 million years,” he wrote. He said he found it “a humbling experience.”

The astrobiological connection is perhaps already clear, if a bit distant. Sivitilli said studying cephalopods and other alternative forms of intelligence here on Earth might provide perspective to help us better identify and understand life 鈥� intelligent or not 鈥� if we ever run across it in the cosmos.

Humankind will not set foot on habitable exoplanets light-years away in the foreseeable future 鈥� so it takes a certain leap of faith to study Earthbound creatures as a proxy for extraterrestrial life. Sivitilli knows this.

“Yes, but I feel like that is a lot of what astrobiology is doing,” he said. “They are looking at extremophiles and saying, ‘Maybe this is what a microbe might look like 鈥� out there.'”

In the meantime, he said, such study could have value closer to home as well.

“Maybe I am just interested in cognition in general 鈥� alternate forms of cognition, computation, communication. Because I feel like this goes beyond extraterrestrial intelligence 鈥� maybe this is saying something about AI.”

Sivitilli and Gire will discuss their work on June 26 as part of the weeklong conference, at the Bellevue Hyatt Regency Hotel.

###

For more information, contact Sivitilli at domsivi@uw.edu