NASA Scientist visits DCU
Wednesday 9 January 2008

Dr Gayle Philip

Dr Gayle Philip is a Bioinformatician working at NASA Astrobiology Institute at the University of Hawaii, Manoa. By studying unusual environments on earth scientists hope to discover previously unknown life forms. But also these environments are analogous to those on other planets such as Mars, therefore studying these environments lends a greater understanding of the life they can support here and elsewhere. Dr Philip was invited to speak about her research at DCU by fellow Bioinformatician and DCU academic, Dr Mary O Connell (School of Biotechnology).

Currently Dr Philip, and scientists collaborating with her, are examining a cave in the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. The cave known as Big Ell is located in the Kilauea Crater. Dr Philip and colleagues are interested in the types of life forms that can live in this dark/primitive environment and how they interact with each other to create a living community. They are focusing their research on a microbial mat located at the entrance of the Big Ell Cave. Despite negligible levels of light and lack of nutrients from their environment, these microbes are thriving in large blanket like structures covering the surface of the cave walls. This site is particularly interesting in an Astrobiological sense as many Martian volcanoes (e.g.Ceraunius Tholus) were built from individual flows emplaced by channels and lava tubes, which are analogous to Hawaiian eruptions. Therefore caves such as Big Ell also exist on Mars. Moreover, organisms on Mars may have moved into these caves to get away from the intense radiation. Dr Philip is sampling these microbial mats and identifying the species within it, to understand how this community survives and if any previously unknown life forms exist in it.

“By performing such an analysis, we are studying organisms that are not easily cultured in a laboratory, as well as organisms in their natural environment. This gives a better indication of interactions between various microbes which allows the mat to survive in very low (essentially dark) levels of light and nutrient poor surroundings and may even reveal novel organisms”, said Dr Philips.

Gayle spent 14 years living in South Africa before moving with her family to Lucan, Dublin in 1994. She has been working with NASA for over a year. Dr Gayle Phillip and Dr Mary O'Connell completed their PhD's at the research lab of Dr James McInerney NUI Maynooth.