Biosignatures of Early Earths
Abstract
A major goal of NASA's Origins Program is to find habitable planets around other stars and determine which might harbor life. Determining whether or not an extrasolar planet harbors life requires an understanding of what spectral features (i.e., biosignatures) might result from life's presence. Consideration of potential biosignatures has tended to focus on spectral features of gases in Earth's modern atmosphere, particularly ozone, the photolytic product of biogenically produced molecular oxygen. But life existed on Earth for about 1(1/2) billion years before the buildup of atmospheric oxygen. Inferred characteristics of Earth's earliest biosphere and studies of modern microbial ecosystems that share some of those characteristics suggest that organosulfur compounds, particularly methanethiol (CH(3)SH, the sulfur analog of methanol), may have been biogenic products on early Earth. Similar production could take place on extrasolar Earth-like planets whose biota share functional chemical characteristics with Earth life. Since methanethiol and related organosulfur compounds (as well as carbon dioxide) absorb at wavelengths near or overlapping the 9.6-microm band of ozone, there is potential ambiguity in interpreting a feature around this wavelength in an extrasolar planet spectrum.
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If Archean life was exclusively chemotrophic, then it may have decreased a preexisting abiotic disequilibrium, mostly from the H2-CO2 pair in the atmosphere.
“If Archean life was exclusively chemotrophic, then it may have decreased a preexisting abiotic disequilibrium, mostly from the H2-CO2 pair in the atmosphere (32).”
From Disequilibrium biosignatures over Earth history and implications for detecting exoplanet life (2018) · cites this paper as [32]
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- Authors
- Pilcher, C. B.
- Affiliations
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration (US)
- Corresponding author
- Pilcher, Carl B.
- Venue
- Astrobiology
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2003-09
- Volume
- 3
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 471-486
- ISSN
- 1531-1074 (ISSN-L)
- 1557-8070
- OpenAlex
- W2005751973
- Cited by
- 126
- References
- 61
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 8 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 6 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 5 · 2018: 32 · 2017: 9 · 2016: 5 · 2015: 4 · 2014: 2 · 2013: 5 · 2012: 4
- FWCI
- 0.58
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Astrobiology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- NASA Headquarters
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Space Science and Extraterrestrial Life
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Planetary Science and Exploration
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Origins and Evolution of Life
- Keywords
- biosignatures, early Earth, exoplanets, habitability, methanethiol, organosulfur compounds, microbial ecosystems, carbon dioxide
- MeSH terms
- Archaea, Bacteria, Phylogeny, Earth, Planet
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