[1] Detection of the organic matter on Mars is one of the main goals of the future Martian landing missions. Yet, the degradation of organic molecules by cosmic ray irradiation on Mars is often ignored. We calculate the radiation dose accumulation rates from solar and galactic cosmic rays at various depths in the shallow Martian subsurface. We demonstrate that a 1-billion-year outcrop on Mars accumulates the dosage of $500 MGy in the top 0-2 cm and $50 MGy at 5-10 cm depths. We show that the preservation of ancient complex organic molecules in the shallow ($10 cm depth) subsurface of rocks could be highly problematic if the exposure age of a geologic outcrop would exceed 300 Myr. We demonstrate that more simple organic molecules with masses $100 amu should have a good chance to survive in the shallow subsurface of rocks. Implications to the sampling strategy for the oncoming Martian missions are discussed. Citation: Pavlov, A. A., G. Vasilyev, V. M. Ostryakov, A. K. Pavlov, and P. Mahaffy (2012), Degradation of the organic molecules in the shallow subsurface of Mars due to irradiation by cosmic rays, Geophys. Res. Lett., 39, L13202,

The propagation of cosmic rays inside our galaxy plays a fundamental role in shaping their injection spectra into those observed at Earth. One of the best tools to investigate this issue is the ratio of fluxes for secondary and primary species. The boron-to-carbon (B/C) ratio, in particular, is a sensitive probe to investigate propagation mechanisms. This paper presents new measurements of the absolute fluxes of boron and carbon nuclei, as well as the B/C ratio, from the PAMELA space experiment. The results span the range 0.44 -129 GeV/n in kinetic energy for data taken in the

On the 15 th of June 2006, the PAMELA satellite-borne experiment was launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome and it has been collecting data since July 2006. The instrument allows precision studies of the charged cosmic radiation to be conducted over a wide energy range (100 MeV-100's GeV) with high statistics. The primary scientific goal is the measurement of the antiproton and positron energy spectrum in order to search for exotic sources, such as dark matter particle annihilations. PAMELA is also searching for primordial antinuclei (anti-helium), and testing cosmic-ray propagation models through precise measurements of the antiparticle energy spectrum and precision studies of light nuclei and their isotopes. Moreover, PAMELA is investigating phenomena connected with solar and earth physics. Results of the antiproton and positron data will be presented.

We report an accurate measurement of the geomagnetically trapped proton fluxes for kinetic energy above ∼ 70 MeV performed by the PAMELA mission at low Earth orbits (350 ÷ 610 km). Data were analyzed in the frame of the adiabatic theory of charged particle motion in the geomagnetic field. Flux properties were investigated in detail, providing a full characterization of the particle radiation in the South Atlantic Anomaly region, including locations, energy spectra, and pitch angle distributions. PAMELA results significantly improve the description of the Earth's radiation environment at low altitudes, placing important constraints on the trapping and interaction processes, and can be used to validate current trapped particle radiation models.