NASA's Quest For Life
Is life on Earth the only life that has ever been created?
NASA scientists don't think so. A growing file of evidence points towards life's possible origins wherever conditions are right. Some of those other places are right here in our own Solar System.
Open to the public in April, 1999, Quest for Life is the signature film of the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida and is on display in its own specially constructed "Universe Theater."
Life may be abundant in the universe, the only for us to find out is to go beyond Earth and take a look.
The theatrical production takes visitors on a 3.5 billion year journey through space and time.
An extraordinarily beautiful animation of the molecule of life, DNA, is seen in shimmering detail as it unwinds and self-replicates before our very eyes.
From life's mysterious beginnings in the ancient past to the near future when spacecraft will explore for life under the shifting ice of Jupiter's moon, Europa, audiences will experience things never before seen on screen.
An entirely original production, the show combines 35mm scenes with Digital 24-frame High Definition Video sequences plus all-new computer visualizations produced in Metavision's in-house computer graphics department.
Special production methods have achieved 35mm
projected images which are significantly better looking than typical movie theater images. The six channel surround sound track was finessed by Academy Award winning Soundelux and the complex original score was composed by Scott Rea.
Viewers will be taken deep beneath Earth's seas where life forms derive energy from volcanic vents and deep into interstellar space searching for life that may have developed there.
The successor to the Space Shuttle is seen in high Earth orbit as the future of telescopes, the Planet Finder, is assembled in space. This ultra high technology eye in the sky will be sensitive enough to detect oxygen in the atmospheres of planets circling distant suns, a sure sign of photosynthesis and life.
Views from the atomic level of DNA to whole galaxies in motion delight the eye as audiences discover the grand plan behind NASA's Quest for Life in space.
In the words of the poet, T.S.Elliot, "The end of all our explorations will be to return to where we started and see the place for the first time."
This film reveals the wonder, science and deeply human need to explore in a form that will inspire all who see it.
2001 Update:
Interesting side-note: In Quest for Life we deal with the "Mars Meteor."
It's a chunk of Mars kicked out into space during a large meteor impact. It landed here and has been analyzed for the past several years by NASA. Under electron microsope examination it showed structures usually only associated with early life forms.
Recent, deeper, more thorough probings have shown that certain forms of a mineral, magenetite, which NEVER form without a living cell performing the atom by atom fabrication of its structure, are there in the Mars Meteor.
NASA's Quest for Life has found the strongest evidence so far for life's universal abundance. Life has been on Mars. [February 28, 2001]
Winner: Santa Clarita International Film Festival -
Best Educational Film of the Year Award.Flagstaff International Film Festival - First Place Special Jury Gold Award.
WorldFest Houston - Gold Award -Flight and Space Travel.
International Film & Video Festival - Gold Camera Award.