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As we prepare for the next planetary mission charged with finding life beyond Earth, the Astrobiology community must continue to improve its understanding of what constitutes a biosignature, through the use of planetary analog samples. The…
The search for technosignatures from hypothetical galactic civilizations is going through a new phase of intense activity. For the first time, a significant fraction of the vast search space is expected to be sampled in the foreseeable…
The Astro2020 report outlines numerous recommendations that could significantly advance technosignature science. Technosignatures refer to any observable manifestations of extraterrestrial technology, and the search for technosignatures is…
The search for life on exoplanets is one of the grand scientific challenges of our time. The strategy to date has been to find (e.g., through transit surveys like Kepler) Earth-like exoplanets in their stars habitable zone, then use…
The key goals of the astrobiology community are to identify environments beyond Earth that may be habitable, and to search for signs of life in those environments. A fundamental aspect of understanding the limits of habitable environments…
Since its inception six decades ago, astrobiology has diversified immensely to encompass several scientific questions including the origin and evolution of Terran life, the organic chemical composition of extraterrestrial objects, and the…
The biosignatures of life on Earth do not remain static, but change considerably over the planet's habitable lifetime. Earth's future biosphere, much like that of the early Earth, will consist of predominantly unicellular microorganisms due…
As astronomers, we are living an exciting time for what concerns the search for other worlds. Recent discoveries have already deeply impacted our vision of planetary formation and architectures. Future bio-signature discoveries will…
We present a new approach to exoplanet characterisation using techniques from complexity science, with potential applications to biosignature detection. This agnostic method makes use of the temporal variability of light reflected or…
The detection of exoplanets orbiting other stars has revolutionized our view of the cosmos. First results suggest that it is teeming with a fascinating diversity of rocky planets, including those in the habitable zone. Even our closest…
In this paper we discuss how we can read a planets spectrum to assess its habitability and search for the signatures of a biosphere. After a decade rich in giant exoplanet detections, observation techniques have now reached the ability to…
We review the field of exoplanetary biosignatures with a main focus upon atmospheric gas-phase species. Due to the paucity of data in Earth-like planetary atmospheres a common approach is to extrapolate knowledge from the Solar System and…
The study of origins of life on Earth and the search for life on other planets are closely linked. Prebiotic chemical scenarios can help prioritize planets as targets for the search for life as we know it and can provide informative priors…
As of 2025, over 6000 planets are known to orbit stars other than our Sun. We can measure their sizes and orbital periods, infer their masses and temperatures, and constrain their compositions. Based on these data, about 1% of extrasolar…
The current goals of the astrobiology community are focused on developing a framework for the detection of biosignatures, or evidence thereof, on objects inside and outside of our solar system. A fundamental aspect of understanding the…
The characterization of exoplanetary atmospheres through transit spectra is becoming increasingly feasible, and technology for direct detection remains ongoing. The possibility of detecting spectral features could enable quantitative…
Speculation about the existence of advanced forms of life in the Universe and in our galaxy, has been since ever a subject of fascination and discussion in fiction, as well as in astrophysics, biology and philosophy. The well-known Fermi's…
The detection of life on rocky exoplanets in the habitable zones of nearby stars would be a paradigm-shifting advance, and it is one of the greatest scientific challenges of our time. There is no single spectral feature that is an…
The search for life in the Solar System hinges on data from planetary missions. Detecting biosignatures based on molecular identity, isotopic composition, or chiral excess requires measurements that current and planned missions can only…
The search for biosignatures necessitates developing our understanding of life under different conditions. If life can influence the climate evolution of its planet then understanding the behaviour of life-climate feedbacks under extreme…