Felipe Gomez - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Felipe Gomez

Advances in applied microbiology

The recent geomicrobiological characterization of Río Tinto, Iberian Pyrite Belt (IPB), has prove... more The recent geomicrobiological characterization of Río Tinto, Iberian Pyrite Belt (IPB), has proven the importance of the iron cycle, not only in generating the extreme conditions of the habitat (low pH, high concentration of toxic heavy metals) but also in maintaining the high level of microbial diversity, both prokaryotic and eukaryotic, detected in the water column and the sediments. The extreme conditions of the Tinto basin are not the product of industrial contamination but the consequence of the presence of an underground bioreactor that obtains its energy from the massive sulfide minerals of the IPB. To test this hypothesis, a drilling project was carried out to intersect ground waters that interact with the mineral ore in order to provide evidence of subsurface microbial activities and the potential resources to support these activities. The oxidants that drive the system appear to come from the rock matrix, contradicting conventional acid mine drainage models. These resource...

Cellular Origin, Life in Extreme Habitats and Astrobiology, 2005

Scheduled to land on August 5, 2012, the Mars Science Laboratory rover, Curiosity, will conduct a... more Scheduled to land on August 5, 2012, the Mars Science Laboratory rover, Curiosity, will conduct an investigation of modern and ancient environments. Recent mission results will be discussed. Curiosity has a lifetime of at least one Mars year ( 23 months), and drive capability of at least 20 km. The MSL science payload was specifically assembled to assess habitability and includes a gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer and gas analyzer that will search for organic carbon in rocks, regolith fines, and the atmosphere; an x-ray diffractometer that will determine mineralogical diversity; focusable cameras that can image landscapes and rock/regolith textures in natural color; an alpha-particle x-ray spectrometer for in situ determination of rock and soil chemistry; a laser-induced breakdown spectrometer to remotely sense the chemical composition of rocks and minerals; an active neutron spectrometer designed to search for water in rocks/regolith; a weather station to measure modern-day envi...

ABSTRACT The Mars Science laboratory (MSL) called Curiosity made a successful landing at Gale cra... more ABSTRACT The Mars Science laboratory (MSL) called Curiosity made a successful landing at Gale crater early August 2012. MSL has an environmental instrument package called the Rover Environmental Monitoring Station (REMS) as a part of its scientific payload. REMS comprises instrumentation for the observation of atmospheric pressure, temperature of the air, ground temperature, wind speed and direction, relative humidity, and UV measurements. The REMS instrument suite is described at length in [1]. We concentrate on describing the first results from the REMS pressure observations and comparison of the measurements with modeling results. The REMS pressure device is provided by the Finnish Meteorological Institute. It is based on silicon micro-machined capacitive pressure sensors developed by Vaisala Inc. The pressure device makes use of two transducer electronics sections placed on a single multi-layer PCB inside the REMS Instrument Control Unit (ICU) with a filter-protected ventilation inlet to the ambient atmosphere. The absolute accuracy of the pressure device (< 3 Pa) and zero-drift (< 1 Pa/year) enables the investigations of long term and seasonal cycles of the Martian atmosphere. The relative accuracy, or repeatability, in the diurnal time scale is < 1.5 Pa, less than 2 % of the observed diurnal pressure variation at the landing site. The pressure device has special sensors with very high precision (less than 0.2 Pa) that makes it a good tool to study short-term atmospheric phenomena, e.g., dust devils and other convective vortices. The observed MSL pressure data enable us to study both the long term and short-term phenomena of the Martian atmosphere. This would add knowledge of these phenomena to that gathered by earlier Mars missions and modeling experiments [2,3]. Pressure observations are revealing new information on the local atmosphere and climate at Gale crater, and will shed light on the mesoscale and micrometeorological phenomena. Pressure observations show also planet-wide phenomena and are a key observation for enhancing our understanding of the global atmospheric flows and CO2 cycle of the Martian atmosphere. The surface pressure is rising at this time of the Martian season, and this is clearly seen by the MSL pressure observations. The current surface pressure is slightly over 8 hPa, which represents a rise of a few % since the beginning of the mission. Our Mars Limited Area Model (MLAM) produces similar results to the observations with some deviations. They are currently under investigation. References: [1] Gómez-Elvira J. et al. (2012), Space Sci. Rev. 170, 583-640. [2] Haberle, R.M. et al. (2013) Mars, submitted. [3] Smith, M. et al. (2006), J. Geophys. Res., 111, E12S13.

The MSL mission places atmospheric and environmental sensors within an equatorial setting -4.5 km... more The MSL mission places atmospheric and environmental sensors within an equatorial setting -4.5 km elevation and between the crater rim and a 5-km-high mountain.

We address early MSL results from the framework of chemical, physical, geological, and geographic... more We address early MSL results from the framework of chemical, physical, geological, and geographic habitability metrics.

Cellular Origin, Life in Extreme Habitats and Astrobiology, 2010

Page 1. 483 Biodata of David C. Fernández-Remolar, author (with other coauthors) of Fluvial Bedf... more Page 1. 483 Biodata of David C. Fernández-Remolar, author (with other coauthors) of Fluvial Bedform Generation in the Berrocal Segment of Río Tinto by Biofilm Activity Dr. David C. Fernández-Remolar is currently Researcher in the Centro de Astro-biología (INTA-CSIC). ...

The Mars surface skin temperature monitored by the Ground Temperature Sensor on REMS, responds to... more The Mars surface skin temperature monitored by the Ground Temperature Sensor on REMS, responds to solar forcing and the interactions between atmospheric, surface, and subterranean properties. We present the evolution of the minimum, maximum, and mean temperatures for the first 100 sols. We also give a brief description of the GTS performance. Finally we explore how the diurnal cycle of ground temperatures relates to energy fluxes due to incident solar radiation fluxes, atmospheric thermal emission, wind driven heat exchanges, heat dissipation into the soil, surface properties, and heat fluxes associated to the rover influence. The analysis helps understand the type of possible thermodynamic interactions occurring between the lower atmosphere and the soil.

Presentation of REMS instrument performance, and science findings during the first 100 sols of op... more Presentation of REMS instrument performance, and science findings during the first 100 sols of operations.

We explore the ground-temperature data from REMS on MSL to characterize their diurnal cycle and p... more We explore the ground-temperature data from REMS on MSL to characterize their diurnal cycle and possible balances with solar radiation and air temperature.

Journal of Geophysical Research-Planets, 2014

ABSTRACT 1] REMS-P, the pressure measurement subsystem of the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Rover... more ABSTRACT 1] REMS-P, the pressure measurement subsystem of the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Rover Environmental Measurement Station (REMS), is performing accurate observations of the Martian atmospheric surface pressure. It has demonstrated high data quality and good temporal coverage, carrying out the first in situ pressure observations in the Martian equatorial regions. We describe the REMS-P initial results by MSL mission sol 100 including the instrument performance and data quality and illustrate some initial interpretations of the observed features. The observations show both expected and new phenomena at various spatial and temporal scales, e.g., the gradually increasing pressure due to the advancing Martian season signals from the diurnal tides as well as various local atmospheric phenomena and thermal vortices. Among the unexpected new phenomena discovered in the pressure data are a small regular pressure drop at every sol and pressure oscillations occurring in the early evening. We look forward to continued high-quality observations by REMS-P, extending the data set to reveal characteristics of seasonal variations and improved insights into regional and local phenomena.

Environmental Earth Sciences, 2011

From Fossils to Astrobiology, 2008

... and habitable region as water, it can be deduced that water is the main factor that character... more ... and habitable region as water, it can be deduced that water is the main factor that characterizes a Mars potential habitat. ... that could have been linked to the emergence of life on Mars, assuming both planetary sytems had an analogous volatile inventory during early ...

Brain Research Protocols, 2001

Drugs of abuse such as cocaine induce a paradoxical aversive effect when paired with a novel tast... more Drugs of abuse such as cocaine induce a paradoxical aversive effect when paired with a novel taste. When a novel gustatory cue is paired with drugs of abuse the resulting conditioned effect is the avoidance of the novel taste. A conditioning paradigm was developed in order to pair saccharin with self-administered cocaine. Rats were trained to lever-press for sweetened milk

Advances in Applied Microbiology, 2011

Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, 2014

ABSTRACT In the first 100 Martian solar days (sols) of the Mars Science Laboratory mission, the R... more ABSTRACT In the first 100 Martian solar days (sols) of the Mars Science Laboratory mission, the Rover Environmental Monitoring Station (REMS) measured the seasonally evolving diurnal cycles of ultraviolet radiation, atmospheric pressure, air temperature, ground temperature, relative humidity, and wind within Gale Crater on Mars. As an introduction to several REMS-based articles in this issue, we provide an overview of the design and performance of the REMS sensors and discuss our approach to mitigating some of the difficulties we encountered following landing, including the loss of one of the two wind sensors. We discuss the REMS data set in the context of other Mars Science Laboratory instruments and observations and describe how an enhanced observing strategy greatly increased the amount of REMS data returned in the first 100 sols, providing complete coverage of the diurnal cycle every 4 to 6 sols. Finally, we provide a brief overview of key science results from the first 100 sols. We found Gale to be very dry, never reaching saturation relative humidities, subject to larger diurnal surface pressure variations than seen by any previous lander on Mars, air temperatures consistent with model predictions and abundant short timescale variability, and surface temperatures responsive to changes in surface properties and suggestive of subsurface layering.