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Our Alien Earth

In this NASA+ documentary series, follow NASA scientists into the field as they explore the most extreme environments on Earth, testing technologies that directly inform NASA missions to detect and discover extraterrestrial life in the universe.

Episodes

Title image for episode 4 of Our Alien Earth, depicting an aerial view of the lava fields of Mauna Loa, Hawai'i, while another volcano, Mauna Kea, looms in the background.

Episode 4: The Lava Tubes of Mauna Loa, Hawai’i

Explore beneath the volcanoes of Hawai’i with four teams of NASA astrobiologists as they investigate how life might survive in the subsurface of other worlds. Inside cavernous lava tubes, these scientists search for microbial life in volcanic rock, analyze subsurface gases, and build an augmented reality model of the field site—all to help advance NASA’s future exploration of Mars and beyond.

Title image for episode 3 of Our Alien Earth, depicting an aerial view of the Aegean sea and the islands of Greece.

Episode 3: The Undersea Volcanoes of Santorini, Greece

Dive alongside Dr. Richard Camilli and his team as they explore undersea volcanoes off the coast of Santorini, Greece. Testing a suite of autonomous underwater vehicles, the team hopes to imbue their robotic explorers with the same scientific reasoning of a human astrobiologist, helping us characterize alien oceans and remotely search for signs of life on distant ocean worlds.

The Making of Episode 3
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Title image for episode 2 of Our Alien Earth, depicting a view of a glacier, valley, and lake in the Isua Greenstone Belt of Greenland.

Episode 2: The Ancient Isua Greenstone Belt, Greenland

Journey into the wilderness of Greenland alongside Dr. Abigail Allwood and her team, as they investigate a controversial claim of ancient signs of life in an outcrop of rocks that are over 3.7 billion years old. Watch as they continue to develop virtual reality technology that is currently being used by NASA’s Mars Exploration Program to bring scientists to sites visited by our Martian rovers.

Title image for episode 1 of Our Alien Earth, depicting an aerial view of a flooded plain of volcanic rock in Iceland

Episode 1: The Lava Fields of Holuhraun, Iceland

Go off-road with Dr. Amanda Stockton and her team as they venture into the lava fields of a recently-erupted volcano, studying how quickly microbial life on Earth recovers from such a catastrophic event. Follow the expedition team as they use drones to map the field site, take samples of volcanic rock, and perform laboratory analyses; all mimicking the same exploration and science performed by the Mars Curiosity and Perseverance rovers.

Ways to Watch

NASA Plus logo with the text The universe at your fingertips. A planet is in the background.

NASA+

Watch the series on NASA+ on the web.

A desktop monitor displaying displaying a scene from Our Alien Earth featuring a NASA scientist dressed in field expedition clothing and carrying scientific equipment walking across lava fields in Hawai'i.

YouTube

Watch the series on YouTube.

Two phones, the left one displaying Our Alien Earth on the NASA+ App. The right screen shows a NASA scientist dressed in field expedition clothing and carrying scientific equipment walking across lava fields in Hawai'i.

More Ways to Watch

Stream NASA+ from 3rd-party streaming services.