Astrobiology, the Emergence of Life, and Planetary Exploration

Astrobiology brings together scientific disciplines focused on deciphering the origin of life, its nature, evolution, and distribution in the universe. Exceptionally rapid progress in our understanding has been made over the past four decades, including new insights into how life could have emerged on Earth, the revelation that life can thrive in the most hostile terrestrial environments, evidence of the presence of liquid water throughout the universe, a controversial discovery of past life in a Martian meteorite that reinvigorated the search for life on Mars, and the discovery of Earth-like planets orbiting stars other than our Sun in the Milky Way. Although Earth is the only planet known to host life in our Solar System, continued advances in the field of astrobiology stimulate the search for life and its origin beyond our planet.