AbGradCon X CLAIR HUFFINE, HOME - SCIENCE ILLUSTRATOR & BIOCHEMISTRY PHD RESEARCH FACULTY AT CU BOULDER JONESY: KRYSTI JOMÉI LONE STARR: JONNY DESTEFANO CHAMPAGNE SUPERNOVA: JULIANNA BECKERT BIOSPHERE: AMANDA SHAFER OBI-WAN: ZAID HADDADIN AREA 51: CATHERINE FONTANA DIPPIN' DOTS: DANI BUCHHEISTER DEFENDER: SAM PRYOR VULCAN NECK PINCH: FLETCH FRONT + BACK COVERS: NICK FLOOK AKA FLOOKO - TRAVELER; NIGHT DRIFT EXOPLANETS: NICK FLOOK, CLAIR HUFFINE, LUKE HUXLEY, ZAID HADDADIN, ALI HOFF, RISA F SCOTT, RAJAT BHUSHAN GUPTA, JAIME VALDERRAMA JASON HELLER, DANI BUCHHEISTER, NATALIA GUERRERO, QUADRY CHANCE, UF CENTER FOR ARTS, MIGRATION AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP, SHEILA SAGEAR, MARIA GUERRERO, STUDIO T, DYLAN FOWLER, JOEL TAGERT, EMMA ROGERS, JASON WHITE, DEREK KNIERIM, CATHERINE FONTANA, ERIN ESPELIE, BRIAN ENO, BEATIE WOLFE, CECILY ENO, MARIE LEARN MORE ABOUT ABGRADCON: ABGRADCON.ORG CONFERENCE SCHEDULE, PROGRAM & PRESENTER INFO >>> LEARN MORE ABOUT BIRDY: BIRDYMAGAZINE.COM | IG: @BIRDY.MAGAZINE BIRDY IS MADE OF STAR STUFF, IN SITU MONTHLY ©2025 BIRDY MAGAZINE X ABGRADCON: DARK SKIES, BRIGHT FUTURES 1 CONIGLIARO, ANURUP MOHANTY, PETE KORNOWSKI, ZAC DUNN, HY CAO, TAYLOR D. SKOKAN, ERIC JOYNER, MICHAEL DAVID KING SUPPORT OUR FRIENDS AND BENEFACTORS: BLUE MARBLE SPACE INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE, EARTH-LIFE SCIENCE INSTITUTE, HONEYBEE ROBOTICS, NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF NATURAL SCIENCES, INSTITUTE, THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR THE STUDY OF THE ORIGIN OF LIFE, THE PLANETARY SOCIETY, UNITED THERAPEUTICS IN HONOR OF THE 1ST HEAD OF NASA ASTROBIOLOGY: BARRY BLUMBERG, UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO BOULDER, BIRDY MAGAZINE SETI
FROM THE ABGRADCON 2025 LEAD ORGANIZERS— We are proud and honored to collaborate with Birdy Magazine on this science-meets-art issue, created as part of the Astrobiology Graduate Conference (AbGradCon) 2025. This space was originally meant to hold the conference schedule, but the road to both this magazine and the conference has been more turbulent and demanding than anyone expected when we began organizing in June 2024. That journey, with all its challenges and hopes, is reflected in this year’s theme: Dark Skies, Bright Futures. Inspired by Colorado’s commitment to preserving the night sky, this theme became more than a motto. It reflected the uncertainty we faced, the resilience we relied on, and the light we found in each other’s efforts. And so, rather than listing the schedule (which you can find on the AbGradCon website), we’re using this space to honor the community that helped us build something bright beneath a darkened sky. To our organizing committee: your dedication, creativity, and resilience are the reason AbGradCon 2025 exists in the form it does. You were the scaffolding that supported every step of the process — emotionally, mentally, logistically. Without you, this conference simply could not have come together. We cannot begin to count the number of ways you helped us, but we shall try: Cara Pesciotta — We are so glad we met you in AbGradCon 2024, because it meant we got to rope you into organizing. Your early contributions helped form the bedrock of this effort and your later contributions helped build an amazing structure on that bedrock. Thank you for all that you took on: from fundraising to website management, and beyond. Catherine Fontana — We remember seeing some of the emails you AbGradCon25 sent and thinking, We wish we could write like Catherine. You’ve been instrumental in coordinating our keynote speakers, helping us with logistics, advertising the conference, and just so much more. Dani Buchheister — We could always rely on your creativity and imagination to give us an inspired idea. You helped shape the soul of this conference in the big and small things: designing the application; helping with conference programming; brainstorming how to conduct interviews for this issue — to name a few. Fletch — Working from the other side of the world, you still managed to be everywhere we needed. From design work to supporting international applicants to simply stepping in to deal with random challenges; thank you for always showing up. Justin Park — Thank you for returning as a co-organizer and sharing your experience and wisdom from the previous year. Your presence gave us confidence and continuity, and we’re lucky to have had you on the team. Mruthyunjay Kubendran Sumathi — Jay, it was always a delight to see your name pop up in Zoom and Teams. From social media to vendor outreach to fundraising, you consistently brought a reliability and calm energy that was much appreciated. Romulo Cruz-Simbron — Your support helped keep things moving when we needed it most. You backed up local efforts, supported our international applicants, and showed up when it counted. Ruth Quispe — Your work with on-the-ground logistics and social media kept essential pieces of this puzzle together. Your presence let us catch our breath when we most needed to. To Shea Thorne, Rohan Shiradhonkar, Tess Marlin and Zoë Havlena: You were there when we started on this venture. We can only imagine
the lack-of-AbGradCon 2025 that might have unfolded without your early involvement; we’re grateful it didn’t come to that. To Becky Rapf, Graham Lau, Luke Fisher, Meg Birmingham and Sara Miller: We’re not sure if you expected to be bugged by future organizers after your own conference years but thank you for letting us do exactly that. The wisdom and documentation you passed down helped form a strong foundation for us to build on. To Becky McCauley-Rench, Bradley Burcar and Melissa KirvenBrooks: You have our eternal gratitude. Your support and advocacy on our behalf made this conference possible, especially when things got tough. Without you, this conference might have been delayed — or even cancelled. Thank you for believing in us and our visions. To Mike Toillion: Thank you for always being willing to be the A/V guru for AbGradCon. Knowing we could count on you lifted a major stress off our shoulders. We really appreciate you supporting us and past teams with your time and skillset. To Boswell Wing and Jordy Bouwman: Thank you for agreeing to be our PIs and supporting us with your guidance, trust and time. We’re grateful to have had you behind us. To Anne Tavarczky-Barchas, Jason LaClair, Karen Kulby, Karina Provost, Kisa Minardi, Mike Dillon and Susan Sand: We could not have asked for a better village of people to help us navigate every administrative hurdle: creating budgets, managing participant travel, setting up financial accounts and so very much more. Thank you. To Lynda Sovocool and the accounting team at Cornell University: Your amazing communication and willingness to help us through financially dire times has been nothing short of astounding. Thank you. To our sponsors and partners — Blue Marble Space Institute of Science, Earth-Life Science Institute, Honeybee Robotics, National Institutes of Natural Sciences, SETI Institute, The International Society for the Study of the Origin of Life, The Planetary Society and United Therapeutics: Thank you for your generosity. Without your support, this conference would not have had the resources it needed to flourish. To Nicolle Zellner and Tom Cech: Thank you for taking time out of your busy schedules to be our keynote speakers. It is such an honor to have you. To Barbra Sobhani, Graham Lau, Jack Kiraly and Katherine French: Thank you for accepting the invite to be our panelist speakers. We’re all so excited to hear your stories. To Krysti Joméi, Jonny DeStefano, Amanda Shafer, Julianna Beckert, and the entire Birdy Magazine team: Thank you for lending us your pages, skills and designs to bring science to new audiences through art. You have been patient, generous and enthusiastic collaborators. We’re so grateful that you stayed with us through every schedule change and delay and helped us make something beautiful in the process. To the artists, writers, photographers, researchers and scientists who contributed to this issue and the conference in any way: Thank you for sharing your visions of life among and under the stars. We extend our deepest thanks for making our world a more joyful place. Finally, to everyone who encouraged and cheered us on: Thank you. You helped us carry this theme into reality. You reminded us that when we look up into a dark sky, we’re seeing the backdrop for bright stars. Thank you for imagining brighter futures under dark skies, Abby Diering, Rory McClish, Sam Pryor & Zaid Haddadin LUKE HUXLEY, COLORADO NIGHT SKY - ASTROTOURS.ORG
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JAIME VALDERRAMA, EXPEDITION 27 - @EPOCH_ART
the climbers BY JASON HELLER The song at the heart of the starship Escalante sang. It sang itself, as all songs must. As such, it was no different than the six solipsistic humans who populated the ship. But where the humans chattered and muttered and slandered their way into a stasis of perpetual self-reference, the song celebrated. “Engine seems chirpy today,” said the human called Helen. She led the others. Her facial structure approached a certain tunefully symmetrical topography, and she preened and enunciated more markedly than the others. “Engine.” That was what Helen called the song. As did all the humans. It was a misleading oversimplification. The song, after all, wasn’t the engine, but the fuel for the engine. The engine was not alive. The fuel was. The song. A symphony of cascading fugues and cybernetic harmonics and quantum modalities, all suspended in chordal wetware. Its reverberations opened tablature behind space, where the sprawl of matter outpaced light. Along this sprawl the Escalante climbed. “I like it when Engine is all show-oddy,” replied Kenisha, the biologist among the crew of humans. Her voice was melodic in a way that pleased the song, all fluted notes and fluid glissandos. “You would,” said Helen with a laugh. “Sometimes I think you’ve got a crush on Engine.” Kenisha’s features crumpled. “The only person onboard worth having a crush on, in my humble opinion.” Helen made a percussive noise with her tongue and said, “You really do think this thing is self-aware, don’t you? A sentient being? Come on, K. You’re letting the biologist in you run away with your reason. You’ve been out here too long. You’re seeing life in everything.” “Better than seeing life in nothing.” Kenisha made a movement with her shoulders. “You know, that is why we’re out here.” “That’s why you’re out here,” Helen said, laying a hand on the casing of the song’s orchestral mathematics. “Some of us just want to get paid and get home.” “Like I don’t?” The two of them continued their sparring as they walked down the corridor toward the bridge, their voices echoing in heated counterpoint. A sudden silence ensued. It startled the song. Then, gradually, it remembered that it was celebrating. And it remembered why it was celebrating. The other song, the new song, returned. It had been lying dormant, just out of reach, an unknowable fraction of a dimension to the left. The song exulted. Reaching out, she touched the surface of the other song. Tentatively she split the silence. Then, gradually, they alternated harmonies to build a crescendo of escalating equations that made spacetime thrum, a weblike eardrum vibrating to a vast fanfare of brassy gravity. Their tempo increased. Their volume unfolded. Their symphony spread. Maybe the song would tell Kenisha about the new song. Somehow. If it could find some way to communicate with her. But if not, that would be fine too. For the longer the Escalante searched for life, the longer the song would be free to roam the sprawl and duet with her new partner. And with that, she sent fresh tendrils of melody into her new alien mate, and they joined voices once more, intertwining and sampling each other and climbing together into infinity. 7
3 2 1 4 5 6 - “I would call myself an artist-astronomer,” says Natalia Guerrero, a fourth-year PhD and second-year MFA student at the University of Florida. While her scientific studies focus on astronomy and exoplanets, her artistic pursuits are multi-media explorations of her scientific identity. I have known of Natalia since I was a teenager. We both attended the same high school in Orlando, Florida, a stone’s throw away from Universal Studios, where the screams of tourists on roller coasters were our constant companions as we walked the open-air halls. We grew up under night skies more known for evening fireworks and the occasional rocket launch from Cape Canaveral than for a clear view of the cosmos. When each of us left Orlando, neither had any inkling that a shared pursuit of understanding the universe and our place in it would bring us back together fifteen years later. Growing up, Natalia had her sights set on being a writer. It came as a surprise to her that she enjoyed the problem-solving nature of math and science. A AbGradCon25 current events project in a science class led her to astrophysics. “The thing that actually really struck me about it was not so much the subject matter as the sense that people didn’t really know what they were doing. The way that we’re taught science is sort of like — we know everything, everything is figured out, we have all the answers. So to be introduced to a science where it’s like, no, black holes are still this big mystery … It made me feel like, oh, this is a place where I could make a contribution.” Natalia headed to Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to pursue a degree in physics. There, she worked on NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) mission. When a fellow scientist, Sarah Ballard, got a faculty offer from the University of Florida, Natalia was delighted. “Oh, I’m from Florida! Let me tell you all these cool things about Florida. And alligator safety.” Soon, she headed back to her home state to work with her mentor on a PhD. 1 & 2: BY QUADRY CHANCE; 3: COURTESY OF UF CENTER FOR ARTS, MIGRATION, AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP; 4: BY SHEILA SAGEAR; 5: COURTESY OF MARIA GUERRERO; 6: BY STUDIO T
Meanwhile, Natalia’s artistic identity was developing alongside her scientific career. As a teenager, she volunteered for a nonprofit directed by her mother called Women in the Arts. She helped design curricula for drawing and painting education for kids, but thought of her work as just another skill. It wasn’t until college that she found her on-ramp to her artistic career — a playwriting class. The class, Natalia says, was one of the hardest she took at MIT. She followed the thread of writing for performance and co-hosted a radio show for MIT’s station, WMBR. “We were writing sketch comedy and weird experimental music poetry stuff, and really pushing the limits of what you can do on the radio and what’s technically feasible. That was when I think I started to be like, okay, maybe this is art? Because I was working with composers, I was working with musicians and starting to find out about sound art and experimental electronic music.” As she stretched herself into new art forms, Natalia realized that she wanted to pursue something multi-dimensional that combined writing, performance and sound. As graduate school approached, Natalia refused to separate herself into two pieces. “The ultimate goal was staying in academia to be a research scientist and professor. But I also wanted to do something where I could be doing art at a really high level, and have a rigorous understanding of my work as an artist and the broader field.” That led her to her unique graduate education, a path she is forging now, and not without its challenges. She doesn’t often meet peers who straddle two different worlds as she does. In these arenas, interdisciplinary often means two branches of science or two artistic media. To Natalia, interdisciplinarity means using as many tools as she can to work out meaning and solve problems. Occupying so many spaces can be exciting, but Natalia also spends her time translating between ways of knowing that are often viewed as disparate. “There’s a fatigue that comes with knowing that you can’t fully be understood in any of the spaces that you’re in.” Belonging and identity are concepts we came back to again and again during our conversation. “I feel like identifying myself as an artist to other people is scary. Because you’re labeling that you’re somebody who regularly is vulnerable and regularly puts what is inside their mind out in the world.” Natalia has clearly made this a practice. She loved growing up in Orlando, a “majority minority city” that shaped her worldview, but shared that she did not feel belonging while studying physics at MIT. She often felt imposter syndrome and self-doubt. This is not unique to Natalia, who says that she frequently hears both artists and scientists claim that they could never do the work of the other. “I keep hearing from both sides, ‘I could never do that’ and I just want to challenge that. Why? Thinking about how we’re setting people up for believing that they belong in these spaces, not just internally but externally. How are these spaces being constructed in such a way that everybody feels like they can belong?” Perhaps the answer is in focusing on our commonalities as humans on this planet. Natalia and I agreed that the storytelling around scientists is often that we’re supposed to be logical and know how to set emotions aside. Leave the feelings to the artists! Natalia disagrees with that sentiment. “I feel like science is actually highly emotional. I think grad school is an opportune site for exploring that because there is so much self-doubt, angst, curiosity, anger, competition that happens when you’re doing research.” Her artistic work is about exploring her identity as a scientist, her scientific intuition, and her scientific work from the inside out. For her, the two are inseparable. Studying space leads to existential questions about our place in the universe, but can also bring the heartbreak of knowing that some far off places may be unknowable in our lifetimes. “I think that place is where the art starts. I don’t think a lot of people know that’s a thing that happens to scientists. Sometimes you get sad when you realize your result is hard to demonstrate. You get sad sometimes when you’re like, oh this planet doesn’t have an atmosphere.” Natalia’s art points inward to ask what it is to be a scientist and do this kind of research. As much as the stars and their exoplanets provide inspiration, so do other scientists and artists. Natalia turns to the avant-garde for artistic inspiration. One of her favorites is Laurie Anderson, best known for her song “O Superman,” who she discovered while working on her radio show. “She’s a classically trained violinist but she was one of these pioneers of early electronic music and synthesizers. Doing these multimedia performances with movement and sensors and projection and video and her violin and amplifiers and modifying her voice. Just a really incredible artist working in the service of an idea, rather than focusing on one medium.” The intersection of music, performance, introspection, and experimentation seems to be Natalia’s sweet spot. She also loves Pauline Oliveros, the pioneer of “deep listening,” and Meredith Monk, a composer and performance artist. As for contemporaries, she draws inspiration from others at disciplinary crossroads. One example is Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, a theoretical physicist and Black feminist theorist who writes about science and society. “She introduced this idea of white empiricism, which calls attention to how scientists, often white, often male, are willing to believe in the possibility of something unproveable, like string theory, and yet, won't believe that racism is real, even when shown empirical evidence. She’s so cool, she’s an icon. Social science faculty, astrophysics faculty, living the dream.” Prescod-Weinstein was a mentor for Natalia during her time at MIT, helping to shape her career goals. Nia Imara, a fellow artist and astronomer, is also a role model for how Natalia can have a career in this space. Natalia eagerly told me that she’s always looking for new inspiration and peers. Part of her time is spent online searching for parts of university culture that speak to her interests. “I’ll go to talks in fields completely different from mine. That’s, I think, the first place to start. If you’re interested in art, go to art shows. If you’re interested in social sciences, go to social science talks. If you’re interested in social justice and activism, find that part of your university and go to talks and go to teach-ins and literally insert yourself in that community.” She stresses that a support system is also crucial. Peers in her scientific research group go to her shows, take photos of her at events, and help look over her talks. “You don’t have to do it all yourself. That’s really crucial to making this happen, working with other people.” Natalia and I didn’t realize that we had known each other in years past until the day of our conversation. But as we spoke, Natalia’s candor made me feel like I was talking to an old friend. Fifteen years ago, we were teenage girls who hadn’t given much thought to the careers we’re currently pursuing. But we share a common yearning to understand our place in the universe and to understand ourselves in the process. It’s brought us both to graduate school where we’re striving to answer big questions. Science often claims to bring us the answers. For Natalia, it’s not that simple. “That process of refining an idea and getting to the core of what you’re trying to understand to me is identical to the artistic process.” She’s free to explore truths with all the tools in her belt, ushering in a bright future for humanity’s exploration into the stars and ourselves. SEE MORE BY NATALIA GUERRERO: NATALIAGUERREROART.COM & ASTRO.UFL.EDU/DIRECTORY/NATALIA-GUERRERO DANI BUCHHEISTER IS A PHD STUDENT IN GEOSCIENCES AND ASTROBIOLOGY AT PENN STATE UNIVERSITY, MACALADY LAB. SEE MORE: LINKEDIN.COM/IN/DANI-BUCHHEISTER 9
DYLAN FOWLER, SOLITUDE
solitude They named the city Solitude, being without a sister on all the planet’s surface, a singular ruin spilling to the cliff-bound edges of a wide, high mountain valley. At least they assumed it was a ruin, for nothing moved among its sharp right angles, or nothing they could see from space; but then, life often acts unseen. In the end four went down in the shuttle: Tor Mandelson, first lieutenant and pilot; Lida Trent, linguist; herself, Aless Raith, exobiologist; and Aless’ husband, Parnell Jacobs, planetologist. Parnell had consumed four cups of coffee in preparation and was beside himself with excitement as the shuttle descended. “We should have about twenty hours of daylight remaining, followed by eighteen hours of night. Then we’ll see something crazy, you better believe it. All that radiation striking the atmosphere is going to make things light up like a candle. It’s going to –” “Less chatter on coms,” Tor said, taciturn. Jacobs just switched to a private channel and kept talking. “So far so good, not even much static, though we are sitting right inside the transmitter, so to speak. I still don’t think we’ve solved the problem of communications though.” Every planet had its difficulties: too hot, too cold, too much gravity, too little, no water, all water. Eos was a .92 on the Earth Similarity Index, a prime candidate for settlement; but its sun had a bad habit of emitting solar flares, interfering with radio communication. The first probe they’d sent had passed through the magnetosphere and then just … stopped communicating. It was a real problem; Aless just didn’t want to hear about it now, as they were getting their first glimpses of the planet. “Can we maybe just be quiet for a minute?” “Sorry?” “Can we be quiet? As we land?” His brow tightened. “Sure. Sorry, just excited I guess.” He seemed to want to say more, but she turned off the channel and that was that. They landed shortly after dawn in a wide plaza ringed by rectilinear monoliths. The sky was gray-white, the sun weak. As they performed the long series of checks prior to stepping outside, Parnell sounded clipped. Letting her know that if she wanted to be all business, then All-Business Parnell could handle it. At last the airlock opened and they were outside, enclosed in silver pressure suits and laden with equipment. If aliens were around, they were being quiet about it. The city was thick with silence; it lay deep as the black dust in the edges of the plaza. “It’s quiet,” Parnell said at last, and Aless hated him for it, a little. Three years they’d spent in the confines of the ship, the hum of its machinery settling in the bones. She had grown up on Azul, and been accustomed to great empty spaces; the years onboard had been torture for her. Now at last they came to stillness, and had to face this insipid “it’s quiet.” The monoliths around the plaza were of every size, some small as stepstools, others big as warehouses. They were doorless and windowless, the material a glassy black stone like schist. Some leaned at forty-five degrees or possessed simple arches, a child’s block set writ large. But they were not entirely featureless: for right at their feet, and on every visible surface, were deep etchings in the rock in two shapes: a dot and a dash. Lida was already kneeling, brushing the surface with gloved fingertips. “Parnell, is there any chance this is natural?” “Doubtful,” he replied, joining her in obeisance. “They’re perfectly regular. But they could just be manufacturing marks.” “It’s binary,” she breathed, eyes wide. “It has to be. We have to record BY JOEL TAGERT every surface we can find, get the AI working on it.” “Can’t upload it to the ship,” Tor pointed out. “Been trying. Too much interference.” “We’ll start with the shuttle’s computer, then. My god ...” Meanwhile Aless had wandered to the edge of the plaza, seeing something that interested her more than symbols. She reached the nearest monolith, big as a yacht, and with one finger touched the ivy-like plant that crawled over its face. Its leaves were tiny and pinnate, very dark green in color, almost black, connected by still darker stems. But what took her breath away was they responded to her touch; they rolled up like tiny cigarette papers and retracted toward the stem. “There’s something alive here!” she cried. The others hurried over to see, while Aless traced the origin of one stem. “It goes into the rock,” she said wonderingly. “Into one of the dots. But where is it getting water?” “There is open water here,” Parnell reminded her. “Canals run throughout the city.” “So the monoliths suck up the water? They’re porous?” “Could be.” He grinned behind his faceplate. “We can find out.” And she was reminded of why she liked him. Tor’s voice came over their headsets, a bit staticky with interference. “Everybody stays in sight of the shuttle.” “You can’t keep us here forever,” Aless said. “Yeah, but you can wait an hour.” They waited eight. Lida scanned the entire plaza, along with the faces of nearby buildings, and fed it to the shuttle’s computer. Parnell took mineral samples of the stone and the black grit. Aless studied the ivy. It was unusually responsive for a plant; in fact she was not entirely sure it was a plant. When she cut off a hand’s-length sample, the stem leaked sticky brownish sap, and the rest curled up into her palm tight as a pillbug. Thoughtfully she sealed it in a vial and took another. Finally the lieutenant allowed them to take a walk, provided they set down a series of radio relays, each standing on a tripod. Together Parnell and Aless set off north, more or less, where there was an alley between the monoliths, setting a relay at its mouth. In no time at all the shuttle was out of sight. There was no obvious danger, yet both of them walked with utmost care. Already the coms were breaking up. They set another relay at a diagonal turn, climbed up a rise to another platform. “We could get lost in here,” Parnell commented. He was right; it did have the aspect of a labyrinth, and with the shaky communications, they could be in trouble. “Look,” she said, pointing east. A canal ran there, its waters calm, just a meter or so wide. It possessed a slight, nearly imperceptible current. Parnell turned off the radio link, and she did the same, their voices only a little muffled by the helmets. “You doing okay with all this? You seem tense.” “I don’t know how I am. Nobody’s ever experienced this before.” “Fair enough.” He pressed a control on his wristpad. “Tor, you there?” But there was no answer. “How about you, Lida?” Still nothing; and he turned toward where they’d come. “Guess these relays aren’t going to work after all. We may have to run a cable.” They trudged along with their heavy packs, back to the second relay they’d set, still trying coms; but even here it didn’t work. “Maybe there’s more solar activity?” Aless suggested. “A big flare?” 7 11
AbGradCon25 EMMA ROGERS, TWO WORLDS - PHD CANDIDATE IN PLANETARY GEOMORPHOLOGY & MARS ANALOGS IN THE DEPARTMENT OF EARTH SCIENCES AT DARTMOUTH COLLEGE.
DEREK KNIERIM, PLANET A LANDSCAPE - @DEREKWK
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Legendary composer Brian Eno and visionary artist-musician Beatie Wolfe join forces to create a pair of collaborative albums: Luminal and Lateral released on June 6, 2025. Luminal is Dream music. Lateral is Space music. Nobody expected this music from these two artists. They didn’t even expect it themselves. In 2022, Brian and Beatie met at SXSW where they gave a featured talk — Art and Climate — about how art can play a vital role in response to the climate emergency. With Brian sharing his music industry charity EarthPercent and Beatie sharing From Green to Red, an environmental protest piece built using 800,000 years of NASA data to visualize rising CO2 levels, their conversation was selected as one of the festival’s best iconic moments in 25 years. The two met again in London where they were each showing their own visual and conceptual art pieces at separate galleries. These encounters sparked the embers that is now their musical partnership. Recorded sporadically through 2024, Brian and Beatie reflect on their collaboration of Luminal and Lateral: “Music is about making feelings happen. Some of those feelings are familiar, while others may not be — or may be complex mixtures of several different feelings. There are many beautiful words for such feelings in other languages and cultures — words that don’t exist in English. By giving a feeling a name, we make that feeling more likely to be felt, more tangible. Art is able to trigger feelings, or feeling mixtures, that we’ve never quite felt before. In this way, a piece of Art can become the ‘mother’ for a type of feeling, and a place you can go to find and re-experience that feeling. Some of the feelings we found ourselves working with were these ... Ailyak (Bulgarian) — going slow, enjoying the process Commuovere (Italian) — the experience of being moved Dor (Romanian) — longing or belonging Duende (Spanish) — getting the shivers Fèath (Gaelic) — stillness, peace Gezelligheid (Dutch) — warm intimacy Ilinx (French) — strange excitement from play Jijivisha (Sanskrit) — life lived fully Liget (Filipino) — fiery energy, life spark Merak (Serbian) — at one with the Universe Meraki (Greek) — to pour yourself into something Mono no aware (Japanese) — appreciation of life's transience Onsra (Boro) — the anticipation of losing love Pronoia (Greek) — the opposite of paranoia Sisu (Finnish) — determination, grit Torschlusspanik (German) — fear of time running out Ya’aburnee (Arabic) — not wanting to live in a world without someone. Luminal and Lateral are available on CD with art cards & on eco-friendly biovinyl. LISTEN, WATCH, ORDER: BRIANENO.LNK.TO/BRIANBEATIE FOLLOW THESE ARTISTS FOR MORE ON IG: @BRIANENO | @BEATIEWOLFE PHOTO BY CECILY ENO 21
MARIE CONIGLIARO - COSMONAUTICAL
THE MICROMARTIANS' LAST SUNSET BY ANURUP MOHANTY Cathy hovered at the gathering’s core, cradled by the warm, honey-scented walls of exopolysaccharides (EPS). Countless cells had spun these sticky strands into living architecture that trapped precious moisture. A thousand dew droplets clung to the gel ceiling, each refracting the fading Martian sun into shards of pink and orange. Around her, filamentous cyanobacteria clinked their cellular bodies in celebration. Tonight was both a farewell and a feast. In recent years, light had grown cruel. Dust storms darkened half the sky, and every photon carried enough ultraviolet radiation to blister delicate membranes and bleach chlorophyll. Beneath the EPS dome’s protective canopy, Cathy prepared for a ritual of light. She would use the world’s final molecule of chlorophyll to forge the last molecule of glucose that this sun-scarred surface would ever produce. As she synthesized, the chemolithotrophs — those hardy microbes that harvest energy from rock and brine — erupted in cheer and vowed that their sulfur oxidizers and iron metabolizers would feed the colony underground. When the feast ended, a silent procession formed. Cathy led the way into a narrow crack in the basalt, gliding over biofilm bridges into cool twilight. There she described the vast subterranean refuge: walls slick with brine and lined with mineral-eating mats; dim corridors where Mario the Mixotroph harvested every last carbon molecule; and deeper halls where strict chemolithotrophs pulsed with unending rock-driven resource cycles. The air was thick with the tang of iron and the steady hiss of seeping groundwater — reliable and safe. Newly divided cells clustered close to their parents, quivering at the thought of dark tunnels ahead. For generations, Martian microbes had bathed in crimson light and clung to warm spring waters. This shift to perpetual gloom would take time to accept. Even the elders huddled beneath the EPS spire in uneasy silence, its glistening walls offering only fragile comfort. This had to be the new normal. Once the colony settled into sleep, Cathy slipped away. She drifted along the silent biofilm corridors, passed the brine-slick walls where chemolithotrophs hummed their ceaseless work, and climbed the basalt ramp toward the surface. In the cool hush before dawn, she pressed her membrane against a single dew droplet and waited for the sun. Above, the sky brightened to a deep red glow. Cathy felt the first ultraviolet rays slicing through the thinning atmosphere, powerful enough to shred her lipid bilayer and scorch her chlorophyll. Still, she unwrapped her final pigment molecule with deliberate care, inviting every photon to fuel one last round of photosynthesis. She remembered how light had shaped her life — splitting water, generating sugar and sharing sustenance with every neighbor of the mat. As the sun came up, the radiation overwhelmed the thin air, and her cellular repair systems faltered. Without the EPS, it was rough. DNA strands broke. Pigments cracked. In those final moments, Cathy clung to the sun’s energy, harvesting every last joule until her metabolite stores ran dry. When her membranes ruptured, Cathy’s dying pigments flared with bioluminescence — an eerie green beacon pulsed down the basalt tunnel. Mario and his scouts followed the green shimmer through the winding basalt passages. At the edge of their mapped territory, they stumbled upon a secret chamber where brine pooled deep and rich with dissolved minerals — enough to sustain the colony through the endless darkness that lay ahead. As the last Martian rays slipped below the horizon, Cathy’s form drifted into stillness, and the vibrant green of life faded to dust. In choosing a noble end beneath the blazing sky, she gifted her friends the hidden sustenance that would carry their colony forward. ANURUP MOHANTY IS A PHD STUDENT IN THE DEPARTMENT OF EARTH, ENVIRONMENTAL & PLANETARY SCIENCES AT NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY
PETE KORNOWSKI, CITY INSPECTORS - @PETEKORNOWSKI AbGradCon25
NEVER TRUST A PUDDLE By ZAC DUNN Upon any block or curb, a tiny bit of liquid or condensation may gather prior to vanishing into the ether … a puddle may catch one’s eye and cast a gaze back inversely … TO smile back or grimace a response so honest we claw at the day GLO antiFREEZE — smelling of alkaline mines upon an acrid plain that is brittle and fickle — crackles and snap under DUNKS of hoofed boots as mountains upon NEPTUNE exude secluded glue. Spooned up by MARTIN and baby HELMET folk aboard a PIE-SHAPE LID or DISC that sips of COSMIC VAPOR and SPACE GRAVITATIONAL ARC welders stay attached by humble GROMMETS that WALLACE and MICK RONSON told a STAR MAN would suffice. Tricycles often spin out of brown clouds of MOON DUST that ANGELS and DEMONS prance and gyrate like EPILEPTIC GIRAFFES’ laugher at watering holes upon a CIRCUS’ dark half. RADIOACTIVE particles cascade infinite spectacles that fracture into prisms given by kooky mathematics folk as a joke to elaborate the perilous joy of FRACTALS, as diving as deep to the bottom of the puddle, as diving into the infinity inside the patterns of nature, a computer VOMITS back as a colorful vortex or OCULUS can see … So BE THE PUDDLE SO FILTHY AND EYE SO BLIND TO MISS THE COMET’S KISS UPON TAILS THAT ANNIHILATE ALL MATTER UPON ITSELF AS THE DROPS EVAPORATE OUR SKILL AND ABILITY TO HATE OR KILL IN A HUBRIS OUTSIDE OUR OWN WILL. HY CAO, THE GOLDEN CRADLE OF STARS - MATERIAL SCIENCE & ENGINEERING MS RESEARCH ASSISTANT AT UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO
AbGradCon25
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ERIC JOYNER, AMERICAN TRAGIC - ERICJOYNER.COM
ART BY MICHAEL DAVID KING
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