P051-02
Laser Desorption/Ablation Orbitrap Mass Spectrometry for the Exploration of Astrobiology Targets in the Next Decade
Friday, 11 December 2020: 16:04
Virtual
Ricardo Arevalo Jr1, Adrian E Southard2, Ryan Danell3, Andrej Grubisic4, Lori N Willhite5, Ziqin Ni6, Cynthia Gundersen7, Niko A. Minasola7, Anthony W Yu8, Molly Fahey9, Barbara A Cohen10, Stephanie Getty4, Christelle Briois11, Laurent Thirkell11, Fabrice Colin11, Alexander Makarov12, Emanuel Hernandez9 and CosmOrbitrap Consortium, (1)University of Maryland College Park, Department of Geology, College Park, MD, United States, (2)Universities Space Research Association Greenbelt, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (3)Danell Consulting, Winterville, NC, United States, (4)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (5)University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, United States, (6)University of Maryland College Park, College Park, MD, United States, (7)AMU Engineering, Inc., Miami, FL, United States, (8)NASA/GSFC, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (9)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, United States, (10)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Planetary Geology, Geophysics, and Geochemistry, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (11)Laboratoire de Physique et Chimie de l'Environnement et de l'Espace, CNRS / Université d’Orléans, Orléans, France, (12)Thermo Fisher Scientific, Bremen, Germany
Abstract:
Recent missions that have explored water-rich bodies in the main asteroid belt (e.g., Ceres) and the Jovian (Europa) and Saturnian systems (Enceladus and Titan) have revealed that these Solar System objects may serve as prospective sites of progressive organic synthesis and/or biological activity. Designated as ocean worlds, these planetary systems represent high-priority astrobiology targets for the coming decade due to: the availability of carbon-rich starting materials, including organic matter; water (as liquid or ice) and physical interfaces between aqueous and silicate reservoirs; and, active sources of energy, such as hydrothermal activity, chemical disequilibria, and tidal forces. Perhaps counterintuitively, the Moon presents another critical objective for life detection missions, as the lunar surface acts as a witness plate for the collection of exogenous organic materials that likely contribute to the abiotic blank in more viable environments.
To investigate the plausibility that cryogenic ocean worlds may harbor biomarkers derived from extinct and/or extant life, and to characterize the diversity of abiotic organic materials deposited onto the lunar surface, we are developing several lines of instrumentation that enable the comprehensive compositional analysis of planetary materials. Through the ICEE 2 (targeting Europa) and DALI (targeting the Moon) Programs, we are maturing two laser desorption/ablation mass spectrometers that center on: (i) an OrbitrapTM analyzer capable of ultrahigh mass resolution (m/Δm ≥ 100,000, FWHM) and accuracy (≤ 3 ppm); and, (ii) solid-state laser systems offering continuously variable attenuation and active beam scanning for 2D chemical imaging. However, the oscillators and harmonics that control the laser wavelength and max energy output, and the ion optics that guide ions created at the sample surface into the Orbitrap analyzer, have been designed specifically to meet the science goals of each respective investigation.
Here, we describe progress in the design, build, and test of high-fidelity protoflight models of these instruments, called CORALS (ICEE 2) and CRATER (DALI), and introduce an even more advanced but lower maturity concept called AROMA that unites a dual-source linear ion trap (a la MOMA onboard the ExoMars rover) and an Orbitrap analyzer.
