The SETI Institute announced today that Dr. Lori Marino will receive the 2026 Drake Award, continuing its tradition of celebrating contributions to the search for life and intelligence beyond Earth. Marino is recognized for advancing our understanding of intelligence—on Earth and beyond—and for applying that knowledge to foster meaningful scientific, ethical, and social change.

“Dr. Marino’s work is a true inspiration, not just because her research on intelligence has profound implications for our search for life beyond Earth, but because she is an example of how science can guide us towards deeper, more responsible relationships with all forms of life on Earth,” said Lucian Walkowicz, Chair of the SETI Institute’s Science Advisory Board.

Named after Dr. Frank Drake—the architect of the Drake Equation and the inaugural president of the SETI Institute’s Board of Directors—the Drake Award honors remarkable achievements in SETI and astrobiology. Each year, the SETI Institute’s Science Advisory Board nominates candidates, who are then ratified by its Board of Directors.

 

Nine high school students from Austria, Greece, and Portugal are preparing to step beyond their familiar surroundings into an extraordinary simulated space mission in the Alentejo region of Portugal. This six-day immersive experience, scheduled for 13-19 April 2026 at OLA – Observatório do Lago Alqueva near Monsaraz, Portugal, will see them live and work in a specially designed habitat, operate rovers, and conduct scientific experiments, all without outside assistance. A press conference will be held at the end of the analog mission, on 19 April, offering media the opportunity to interact with the team.

A new study published in Big Earth Data proposes an AI cube framework that integrates GeoAI models into geospatial data cube infrastructures to enhance large-scale Earth Observation data analytics. By introducing a model warehouse, intelligent model selection, and parallel inference pipelines on the Open Geospatial Engine platform, the approach significantly improves analytical capability and reduces inference time by over 80%. The framework advances the transition from traditional data cube processing toward AI-ready spatial data infrastructures.

Artemis II, NASA's first crewed mission to the moon in more than 50 years, represents a shift from short visits toward sustained exploration, where understanding lunar geology and resources become as important as the engineering that gets astronauts there. Artemis II is currently scheduled to launch Wednesday, April 1 at 6:24 p.m. EDT, with backup launch opportunities through early April if needed. 

Lindsay Podjasek, a doctoral student in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at the Rutgers School of Arts and Sciences, studies the moon’s mineral composition. She discusses both Apollo-era science and the emerging goals of Artemis.

Scientists analysing data from the Cassini-Huygens mission have uncovered a significant structural surprise in Saturn’s protective magnetic bubble.

Researchers say this discovery confirms that giant planets operate under a different magnetospheric regime from the Earth’s.

The study in Nature Communications includes Dr Licia Ray and Dr Sarah Badman from Lancaster University with Dr Chris Arridge, formerly of Lancaster. 

Gravitational waves could be responsible for the production of dark matter during the early phases of our universe’s formation, according to results of a new study by Professor Joachim Kopp from Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and the PRISMA⁺⁺ Cluster of Excellence in cooperation with Dr. Azadeh Maleknejad from Swansea University. Their work, published in Physical Review Letters, presents new calculations that explore a novel mechanism for the formation of dark matter through so-called stochastic gravitational waves