# A History of the Pavilion Lake Research Project

The presence of strange structures in Pavilion Lake had been known for
years by the British Columbia diving community and the local Pavilion
residents. However, it was during the mid-1990s that the scientific
discovery of Pavilion Lake's unusual microbialites occurred. It was
immediately apparent that these microbialites and the lake itself was a
scientific goldmine and that many analogous comparisons could be drawn
between the lake's microbialites and those that existed on Earth
millions of years ago. Drs. Bernard Laval (UBC), Chris McKay (NASA ARC)
and others published their findings in the journal *Nature* in 2000.

In early 2004, Dr. Darlene Lim (NASA ARC/SETI Institute) joined NASA ARC
as an NRC post-doctoral fellow, and began to take a closer scientific
look at the lake's limnology, and the geochemistry of the microbialites.
After her first successful field season at Pavilion Lake in 2004, she
established the Pavilion Lake Research Project (PLRP) in partnership
with Dr. Laval at UBC, in order to address the growing interest from her
research colleagues in further exploring this fascinating lake. In 2005,
the PLRP acquired support from the Canadian Space Agency's (CSA)
Canadian Analog Research Network (CARN) program, which has allowed the
research program to flourish and evolve. The project also successfully
acquired a National Geographic Research and Exploration Grant in 2005,
and NASA continues to provide logistics, and education and public
outreach (E/PO) support to the PLRP efforts.

Donnie Reid from the Vancouver Aquarium joined the PLRP in 2004 and
established a formal science diver program at Pavilion Lake. He
continues to act as the project's Dive Safety Officer (DSO), and Acting
Program Manager. Dr. Greg Slater joined the PLRP in 2005 as a Deputy PI
of the project, and has helped to grow the scope and depth of the PLRP's
geochemical investigations. Since 2004, the project has grown to include
over 40 research and support staff participants, and has always
maintained a strong graduate student population, most of whom are
completing Master's and Doctoral programs through their research with
the PLRP.

Today, the PLRP continues to produce conference and peer-reviewed
publications, and is driving ahead with their comprehensive,
multi-disciplinary research into microbialite morphogenesis in the
Pavilion Lake region. The 2008 summer field season for the PLRP will be
an exciting one, as the project will be piloting a research effort in
partnership with Nuytco Research to use one-person DeepWorker
submersibles to explore, map, and sample Pavilion Lake to its deepest
depths (65 m). In concert with these science efforts, the project will
also be piloting an Analog Missions Program to train astronauts in field
science activities, and to help develop exploration success metrics and
protocols for future human operations on the Moon and Mars.

The PLRP is focused on Safety, Environmental Stewardship, Advancement of
Science and Advancement of Exploration. With these principles in mind,
the PLRP is looking forward to more exciting science and exploration in
Pavilion Lake, and to making a real impact on how humans will conduct
science and explorations on the Moon and Mars.