Lisa Harvey-Smith on the Square Kilometer Array and the Australian Astrobiology Meeting
Published on the 10 Jul 2013
The question of astrobiology
By Lisa Harvey-Smith
“So – what do you do?”
The question dreaded by astronomers seeking a quiet social evening. When I do fess up, quite often I get a grilling about alien life on other planets.
The truth is that most astronomers have little stake in finding life on other planets. Our work primarily focuses on studying a particular type of star or galaxy, or probing the physical or chemical processing that drive the evolution of our universe.
So when I was invited to give a talk about the Square Kilometre Array at the Australian Astrobiology Conference, held at the University of New South Wales last week, I was interested but a bit perplexed. What is astrobiology?