"Astrobiology" has been created as a new interdisciplinary academic field that integrates astronomy, solar system science, geochemistry, microbiology, and other disciplines. One of the most profound themes of modern science is to judge if "terrestrial" biology can be "universal" outside the Earth and even outside the Solar System just like physics and chemistry both of which are applicable at anywhere in this Universe. It is expected to derive great contributions for astrobiology from space science, such as space astronomy, Solar System exploration, and planetary science including space environment experiments.

Now, a number of international refereed journals in the astrobiology field have been publishes while NASA has established virtual institutes to invest research grants in this field the most effectively. In Japan, there have been also recent publications of both professional and public books in astrobiology and new organizations to support this research area have been founded.

This workshop is the 8th of the Japan Astrobiology Network (JABN) annual workshop series founded since 2008. It aims to promote interdisciplinary interactions among astrobiology researchers and advancement of this field in Japan. At this time, we will hold this workshop as a 2-days-long international workshop with English as the working language for the first day; thus we encourage inviting both astrobiology experts from overseas as well as young researchers in Japan.

Those who have intention to attend the workshop are required to send the application form, described in the last part of this mail, to the workshop E-mail address: abn8 [at] elsi.jp

8th Astrobiology workshop
* Organized by Japan AstroBiology Network
* Supported by Earth-Life Science Institute (ELSI) at Tokyo Institute of Technology, Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B), MEXT Japan, "Searching for Prebiotic Molecules in the Universe:
Collaboration between Astronomy and Spectroscopy" (PI Masatoshi Ohishi), and Institute of Space and Astronautical Science , JAXA.
* Organizing committee: Shigeru Ida, Daisuke Kiga, Norio Kitadai, Jun Kimura (ELSI, Tokyo tech.)

* Date: Nov 27th (Fri), 28th (Sat), 2015
* Venue: Earth-Life Science Institute (ELSI) at Tokyo Institute of Technology, ELSI-1 bldg, 1st floor Hall
* Registration fee : free
* Banquet fee: JPY 2000 (expected)
* Invited speakers (confirmed)
- Martin Cordiner, NASA Goddard, ALMA observations of Titan's atmospheric chemistry (TBD)
- Steve Charnley, NASA Goddard, Chemistry of interstellar medium and comets (TBD)
- Joseph Kirschvink, ELSI-Titech/Caltech, Water planets on extraterrestrial world (TBD)
- Masahiro Yamamoto, JAMSTEC, Geo-electrochemical systems occurring at submarine hydrothermal environments (TBD)
- Akira Yamaguchi, RIKEN, Chemical evolution in the prebiotic ocean (TBD)
- Yamei Li, RIKEN, Electrochemical nitrogen fixation and the origin of life (TBD)

*Program:
- Nov 27th (Fri) Oral presentation, Poster presentation, Workshop Social/Banquet (working language: English)
- Nov 28th (Sat), Oral presentation, (working language: English or Japanese. English description should be used in posters, and slides.)

* Deadline for presentation: Oct 31st, 2015
* Deadline for registration: Nov 13th, 2015

* Applications for presentations for this workshop must be submitted, to abn8 [at] elsi.jp by Oct 31 (2015), by using the following format
accompanied by an abstract for presentation. Abstracts should be submitted in pdf format and should not exceed one page

--- Application form ----------------------------------------------------------------
Application for 8th Astrobiology workshop:

* Presentation: I would like to present / I do not apply [please erase one of them]
If you would like to present;
* Preferences for presentation style：poster or oral / poster only [please erase one of them]
* Presentation title:
* Please attach your abstract:
(Abstracts will be reviewed by the Organizing Committee. Those that are selected for oral and poster presentations will distributed to workshop participants.)
* Banquet: attend / not attend [please erase one of them]

Name:
Affiliation：
Position：
Business address：
Tel：
E-mail：
--------------------------------------------------------------------------