Pristine lithologies, modifications, astrobiological potential, and habitability of planetary surfaces

绘制行星表面的地质图是一项重要的科学工作。了解天体的表面成分对于解决下列问题至关重要：(1)确保人类探险者的安全；(2)确定可用于支持人类在行星体上更长时间存在的原位资源；(3)帮助了解太阳系的起源和演化；以及(4)了解行星是如何随着时间的推移而演变的。我们绘制行星表面地质图的能力受到这样一个事实的阻碍，即行星表面(即我们通过遥感看到的行星的那一部分)，甚至是没有空气的天体的表面，可能会受到当地环境的影响。诸如风化和侵蚀、风尘、太阳风和宇宙射线的轰击、低气压或无大气压力造成的干燥、温度变化和陨石撞击等因素都可以改变行星表面的组成和/或对我们准确绘制表面地质图的能力产生负面影响。相反，通过认识到这些修饰过程是否以及如何起作用，我们可以洞察行星体的历史。 在航天国家中，加拿大以能够与不同国家和空间探索组织合作而脱颖而出，并被广泛认为是探索任务中的关键参与者，经常贡献关键技术和能力，使我们能够“超越自己的重量”。同样，加拿大空间技术部门的技术专长在若干遥感领域也是世界级的。通过继续参与行星探索任务，我们帮助推动了加拿大的科学和技术，并获得了访问这些任务产生的数据的特权，确保加拿大保持在行星探索的前沿。太空探索是一项可以激励下一代加拿大人并导致人们对科学技术产生更大兴趣的活动。 拟议的研究计划旨在提高我们将我们测量的行星表面(从轨道器、着陆器和月球车)的遥感数据转化为关于行星的起源、历史、进化、宜居性和天体生物潜力的地质知识的能力。这将通过对各种表面修改过程对行星材料和类似物的影响的实验室研究、对行星模拟地点的实地研究(加拿大是独一无二的)以及对目前和未来的行星飞行任务对不同天体的遥感数据的分析相结合来实现。它将涉及开发和应用基于光谱学的工具，以评估宜居性，搜索生物标志物(过去生命的迹象)，并揭示表面修饰过程，以了解潜在的原始矿物学。

Mapping the geology of planetary surfaces is an important scientific endeavour. Knowing a body’s surface composition is essential for addressing issues such as: (1) ensuring the safety of human explorers; (2) identifying in situ resources that can be exploited to support extended human presence on planetary bodies; (3) helping to understand the origin and evolution of the solar system; and (4) understanding how planets evolve over time. Our ability to map the surface geology of planets is hampered by the fact that planetary surfaces (i.e., that portion of a planet that we see with remote sensing), even the surfaces of airless bodies, can be modified by their local environment. Factors such as weathering and erosion, windblown dust, solar wind and cosmic ray bombardment, desiccation due to low or no atmospheric pressure, temperature variations, and meteorite impacts can all modify the composition of a planetary surface and/or negatively affect our ability to accurately map surface geology. Conversely, by recognizing whether and how these modification processes have operated, we can gain insights into the history of a planetary body. Among spacefaring nations, Canada stands out as being able to partner with diverse nations and space exploration organizations, and is widely recognized as an essential player in exploration missions, frequently contributing key technologies and capabilities that enable us to “punch above our weight”. Similarly, the technical expertise of the Canadian space technology sector is world-class in a number of areas of remote sensing. By continuing our engagement in planetary exploration missions, we help advance Canadian science and technology, as well as gaining privileged access to data flowing from these missions, ensuring that Canada remains at the forefront of planetary exploration. Space exploration is an activity that can inspire the next generation of Canadians and lead to greater interest in science and technology. The proposed program of research is designed to improve our ability to transform remote sensing data that we measure for planetary surfaces (from orbiters, landers, and rovers) into geological knowledge about a planet’s origin, history, evolution, habitability, and astrobiological potential. This will be accomplished through a combination of laboratory studies of the effects of various surface modification processes on planetary materials and analogues, field-based studies at planetary analogue sites (with which Canada is uniquely endowed), and analysis of remote sensing data from current and future planetary missions to diverse bodies. It will involve the development and application of spectroscopy-based tools for assessing habitability, searching for biomarkers (signs of past life), and  unravelling surface modification processes to get at the underlying pristine mineralogy.