The explainer astrobiology

What would you say if intelligent aliens came calling?

The prospect of life on Mars – Earth’s planetary next-door neighbour, an alien world that betrays tantalising hints of a watery past – has bewitched humanity for centuries. From the ‘canals’ seen by a

Where did life on Earth begin? That sounds like a relatively straightforward question. Surely life on Earth began… well, on Earth, right? We know this planet had the right conditions for life to arise

There’s a meme that’s been floating around on social media recently, offering encouragement to turn our everyday perspective upside down: “In the entire Universe, wood is rarer and more valuable than

The high-tech Japanese sake company Asahi Shuzo is taking a bold step forward by attempting to brew its sake off-world for the first time, with the ultimate goal of being able to brew sake on the Moon

What makes your team’s discovery on Mars so exciting? We found large organic molecules composed of 10, 11 and 12 atoms of carbon. These long, chain-shaped molecules – called alkanes – are very fragile