00:00Space missions are known for their costly costs.
00:03To give you an idea, a ticket allowing an astronaut to access space starts at about $20 million and can go up to $50 million.
00:12Although NASA has a substantial budget, it constantly strives to optimize its spending and to make savings of several million.
00:20In addition, the agency has understood for a long time that it was not essential to go to a Saturn moon to look for traces of extraterrestrial life,
00:28because all the favorable conditions are already met in Wyoming.
00:32If that appeals to you, you already understand why Yellowstone arouses such interest from NASA.
00:38To explore the possibility of extraterrestrial life, it is essential to study environments that reproduce these conditions.
00:45This is where Yellowstone's thermal sources take on all their importance.
00:50However, it is not the entire park that interests NASA.
00:53Bears, moose and other local species are at the heart of biologists.
00:57These are the geysers, home to microbial life, which captivate their attention.
01:01Note that Yellowstone has more geysers and hot springs than the rest of the world.
01:07In some of its sources, the water reaches temperatures up to 90 ° C.
01:13This may seem useful only to infuse tea, but there is more.
01:18Microbial life survives not only in these extreme conditions, but also thrives after a specific adaptation.
01:24Could these microbes help us to detect traces of life elsewhere? Absolutely!
01:29Let's move on to the park's true star, Great Prismatic Spring.
01:33Its high concentration of silica gives it its spectacular colors.
01:37Silica refracts sunlight.
01:40In particular, the length of blue waves, which gives the source its vivid and sparkling appearance.
01:46What is even more fascinating, however, is not its color, but what it reveals about the evolution of life.
01:53About 4.5 billion years ago, living organisms did not yet know how to capture solar energy.
02:00They used chemical processes, just like those still in operation today in Great Prismatic Spring.
02:08But why mention other planets?
02:11If life on Earth emerged in a way similar to that observed in Yellowstone,
02:15it is very likely that similar conditions exist elsewhere in the universe.
02:19If we manage to identify precisely the origin of life here,
02:23we could considerably refine our quest for traces of life on other planets.
02:30Geysers comparable to those of Yellowstone have been discovered on moons such as Enceladus, orbiting around Saturn,
02:37and Triton, a satellite of Neptune.
02:39But what does it look like to those we observe in Yellowstone?
02:43In 1989, NASA's Voyager 2 probe made a sensation by spotting geysers on Triton,
02:49marking the first observation of such a phenomenon outside the Earth,
02:53not to mention the volcanic eruptions on Io, Jupiter's moon, discovered by Voyager 1 in 1979.
03:01Since then, other geysers have been spotted on other moons of the solar system.
03:07In Yellowstone Park, the water of the geysers is heated by sources from the Earth's bowels.
03:13However, on some distant moons, the heat comes from the forces of the tides
03:17generated by the gravitational attraction of the large planets around which they gravitate.
03:22Just as terrestrial tides are influenced by the Moon and the Sun,
03:25these moons know of phenomena similar, on a much larger scale.
03:30Under their thick, icy layers, there are hot and salty oceans, isolated by this layer of ice.
03:36The forces of the tides, bringing the moons closer and further away from their planets,
03:40generate enough heat to project hot water into space when a crack forms.
03:45This frozen crust, with the hot water underneath, evokes a pond caught in the ice on Earth.
03:51But could there be forms of life evolving in these hidden oceans,
03:55like creatures living under the ice of the ponds?
03:58Scientists want to be sure.
04:00NASA plans to send high-pitched probes to explore these distant moons in search of signs of life.
04:07But these oceans are buried several kilometers under the ice.
04:11How to get there? Well, geysers could hold the key.
04:16In February 2019, a group of planetologists went to Yellowstone in winter
04:21to analyze the similarities between terrestrial geysers and those observed in space.
04:26They knew that Yellowstone geysers were home to resistant microbes, called extremophiles,
04:32which thrive in extreme conditions such as hot or acidic water.
04:36Researchers wanted to learn as much as possible about these microbes and their habitat.
04:41They brought various instruments to measure temperature, pH, and oxygen levels in water.
04:47Specific tools were also used to analyze the chemical composition of ice and rocks,
04:53while scrutinizing the air in search of gas.
04:56They even took samples of water, rocks and ice by capturing thin droplets
05:02on aluminum sheets soaked in geyser steam.
05:06Their main target was the Great Fountain geyser,
05:10located in the Midway Geyser Basin in Yellowstone.
05:13Yellowstone is famous for its impressive shows, repeated 2 to 3 times a day.
05:18However, the winter season left them with surprises.
05:22Some scientists, delayed by the snow, arrived late at night just before the park entrance.
05:28Their SUV then got stuck in a freezer and had to be cleared by a snowplow.
05:34The next day, on board a snowmobile, they traveled nearly 1 km
05:39towards a thick layer of ice to reach the geyser,
05:42while keeping an eye on elephants, bison, and even bears.
05:46On their way to the Great Fountain geyser,
05:49they made several stops to collect samples and take measurements in other basins,
05:54such as Lemon Pool and Surprise Pool.
05:57Despite its apparent isolation, Yellowstone remains much more accessible than moons like Encelade or Triton.
06:03It is an exceptional natural laboratory,
06:05capable of teaching us a lot about terrestrial life and, perhaps, about life beyond our planet.
06:11As far as laboratories are concerned, Great Prismatic Spring can be one in its entirety.
06:16Under the microscope, these bacteria look like matches.
06:20They bear the Latin name of Termus Aquaticus and live in this hot spring.
06:25These microbes have saved millions of lives.
06:28If this seems hard to believe,
06:30know that they have allowed the creation of the basis of PCR tests,
06:33today widely used to obtain rapid and precise medical diagnoses.
06:38In the 1960s, Thomas Brock, a microbiologist,
06:41explored the overheated thermal basins of the park when he made an extraordinary discovery.
06:46Brock was particularly interested in bacteria capable of surviving in extreme environments.
06:52For 10 years, he studied the geysers and thermal sources of Yellowstone
06:56and discovered, in a source called Mushroom Pool,
06:59a microbe capable of surviving in a boiling water.
07:03This small organism, Termus Aquaticus, revolutionized science.
07:07Why?
07:08Well, this microbe is essential to the PCR technique,
07:11or chain reaction by polymerase, used to quickly copy DNA samples.
07:17Before its discovery, heat damaged the enzymes, keeping the DNA intact,
07:22thus complicating the process.
07:24But thanks to Termus Aquaticus,
07:26scientists can heat and cool the samples without degrading them,
07:30making the process faster and more efficient.
07:34This has been made possible by purifying an enzyme called Taq polymerase,
07:39extracted from this microbe.
07:42Yellowstone microbes could also become your ally for a long and tasty breakfast.
07:47A unique microbe, discovered during research funded by NASA,
07:52is now transformed into vegan pancakes for breakfast and cream cheese.
07:57This microbe, found in a hot source called Fusarium Flavolapis,
08:02arouses the interest of space enthusiasts
08:04as a potential source of protein for long-term space missions.
08:08In addition, it uses much less water and soil than beef,
08:12making it an ecological choice.
08:16Originally, researchers studied this microbe to produce biofuels,
08:21but they quickly discovered that it could be grown as a complete protein,
08:25with a texture similar to that of chicken.
08:28This product, marketed as FI,
08:31can be transformed into various foods thanks to a fermentation process
08:35guaranteeing the absence of contaminants.
08:38NASA is even developing a bioreactor to grow FI in space.
08:43Stay tuned.
08:46NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology
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