Lecture Topics

• What is Astrobiology?
• Astrobiology's Fundamental Questions
• NASA's Astrobiology Roadmap and Goals

Main Points

• Definition of astrobiology and life; problems with proposed definitions;
• Main questions addressed by astrobiology
• How does life begin and evolve?
• Does life exist elsewhere in the Universe
• What is the future of life on Earth and beyond?
• Goals of NASA's Astrobiology program

Assigned readings
and bibliography

Required Readings

• http://astrobiology.arc.nasa.gov/roadmap
• The "Definition of Life" section in the Chyba and McDonald's article in Annu.Rev.Earth Planet.Sci. on reserve in the Physics Library; Chyba and Hand's article in Annu. Rev. Astron. Astrophys. 2005. 43:31–74. An electronic version is available via: http://libwww.syr.edu/research/ej . Then type the name of the journal.
• Chapter 1

Other resources