Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g STARS - More than half the stars in our galaxy are small, dim M dwarfs. Until recently, scientists believed these stars put out too little light to support life on any planets that orbited them. But at a recent workshop held at the SETI Institute, a multidisciplinary group of researchers concluded not only that M dwarfs might host habitable planets, but that they might also be good targets in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. See article. Note: This article is from 2005.
g ABODES - European astronomers said Tuesday that they had discovered the smallest planet yet found orbiting another star. The planet could be as little as only 1.9 times as massive as the Earth and belongs to a dim red star known as Gliese 581, which lies about 20 light-years from Earth in the constellation Libra. See article.
g COSMICUS - Researchers have determined a unique way to divert asteroids and other dangerous objects away from Earth. The method involves attaching a tether and ballast to incoming objects, and could help prevent a devastating impact in the future. See article.
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KEPLER'S EXOPLANETS: A MAP OF THE LOCATIONS OF EXOPLANETS, OF VARIOUS MASSES, IN THE KEPLER FIELD OF VIEW. 1,235 CANDIDATES ARE PLOTTED (NASA/WENDY STENZEL)
news.discovery.com
Just in case you haven't heard, our galaxy appears to be teeming with small worlds, many of which are Earth-sized candidate exoplanets and dozens appear to be orbiting their parent stars in their "habitable zones."
Before Wednesday's Kepler announcement, we knew of just over 500 exoplanets orbiting stars in the Milky Way. Now the space telescope has added another 1,235 candidates to the tally - "what a difference 24 hours makes".
Although this is very exciting, the key thing to remember is that we are talking about exoplanet "candidates", which means Kepler has detected 1,235 exoplanet signals, but more work needs to be done (i.e. more observing time) to refine their orbits, masses and, critically, to find out whether they actually exist.
But, statistically speaking, a pattern is forming. Kepler has opened our eyes to the fact our galaxy is brimming with small worlds - some candidates approaching "Mars-sized" dimensions!
EARTH-BRANDTM LIFE
Before Kepler, plenty of Jupiter-sized worlds could be seen, but with its precision eye for spotting the tiniest of fluctuations of star brightness (as a small exoplanet passes between Kepler and the star), the space telescope has found that smaller exoplanets outnumber the larger gas giants.
Needless to say, all this talk of "Earth-sized" worlds (and the much-hyped "Earth-like" misnomer) has added fuel to the extraterrestrial life question: If there's a preponderance of small exoplanets - some of which orbit within the "sweet-spot" of the habitable zones of their parent stars - could "life as we know it" (or Earth-BrandTM Life as I like to call it) also be thriving there?
Before I answer that question, let's turn back the clock to Sept. 29, 2010, when, in the wake of the discovery of the exoplanet Gliese 581 g, Steven Vogt, professor of astronomy and astrophysics at University of California Santa Cruz, told Discovery News: "Personally, given the ubiquity and propensity of life to flourish wherever it can, I would say that the chances for life on [Gliese 581 g] are 100 percent. I have almost no doubt about it."
IMPOSSIBLE? OR 100 PERCENT?
As it turns out, Gliese 581 g may not actually exist - an excellent example of the progress of science scrutinizing a candidate exoplanet in complex data sets as my Discovery News colleague Nicole Gugliucci discusses in "Gliese 581g and the Nature of Science" - but why was Vogt so certain that there was life on Gliese 581 g? Was he "wrong" to air this opinion?
Going to the opposite end of the spectrum, Howard Smith, an astrophysicist at Harvard University, made the headlines earlier this year when he announced, rather pessimistically, that aliens will unlikely exist on the extrasolar planets we are currently detecting.
"We have found that most other planets and solar systems are wildly different from our own. They are very hostile to life as we know it," Smith told the UK's Telegraph.
Smith made comparisons between our own solar system with the interesting HD 10180 system, located 127 light-years away. HD 10180 was famous for a short time as being the biggest star system beyond our own, containing five exoplanets (it has since been trumped by Kepler-11, a star system containing six exoplanets as showcased in Wednesday's Kepler announcement).
One of HD 10180's worlds is thought to be around 1.4 Earth-masses, making it the smallest detected exoplanet before yesterday. Alas, as Smith notes, that is where the similarities end; the "Earth-sized" world orbiting HD 10180 is too close to its star, meaning it is a roasted exoplanet where any atmosphere is blasted into space by the star's powerful radiation and stellar winds.
The Harvard scientist even dismissed the future Kepler announcement, pointing out that upcoming reports of habitable exoplanets would be few and far between. "Extrasolar systems are far more diverse than we expected, and that means very few are likely to support life," he said.
BOTH RIGHT AND WRONG
So what can we learn about the disparity between Vogt and Smith's opinions about the potential for life on exoplanets, regardless of how "Earth-like" they may seem?
Critically, both points of view concern Earth-BrandTM Life (i.e. us and the life we know and understand). As we have no experience of any other kind of life (although the recent eruption of interest over arsenic-based life is hotly debated), it is only Earth-like life we can realistically discuss.
We could do a Stephen Hawking and say that "all kinds of life" is possible "anywhere" in the cosmos, but this is pure speculation. Science only has life on Earth to work with, so (practically speaking) it's pointless to say a strange kind of alien lifeform could live on an exoplanet where the surface is molten rock and constantly bathed in extreme stellar radiation.
If we take Hawking's word for it, Vogt was completely justified for being so certain about life existing on Gliese 581 g. What's more, there's no way we could prove he's wrong!
But if you set the very tight limits on where we could find Earth-like life, we are suddenly left with very few exoplanet candidates that fit the bill. Also, just because an Earth-sized planet might be found in the habitable zone of its star, doesn't mean it's actually habitable. There are many more factors to consider. So, in this case, Smith's pessimism is well placed.
Regardless, exoplanet science is in its infancy and the uncertainty with the "is there life?" question is a symptom of being on the "raggedy edge of science," as Nicole would say. We simply do not know what it takes to make a world habitable for any kind of life (apart from Earth), but it is all too tempting to speculate as to whether a race of extraterrestrials, living on one of Kepler's worlds, is pondering these same questions.
There should be billions of habitable, rocky planets around the faint red stars of our Milky Way galaxy, a new study suggests.
Though these alien planets are difficult to detect, and only a few have been discovered so far, they should be ubiquitous, scientists say. And some of them could be good candidates to host extraterrestrial life.
The findings are based on a survey of 102 stars in a class called red dwarfs, which are fainter, cooler, less massive and longer-lived than the sun, and are thought to make up about 80 percent of the stars in our galaxy.
FINDING SUPER-EARTHS
Using the HARPS spectrograph on the 3.6-metre telescope at the European Southern Observatorys La Silla Observatory in Chile, astronomers found nine planets slightly larger than Earth over a six-year period. These planets, called super-Earths, weigh between one and 10 times the mass of our own world, and two of the nine were discovered in the habitable zone of their parent star, where temperatures are right for liquid water to exist.
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Reference: ufoproofs.blogspot.com
Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. Here's today's news:
g ABODES - The COROT mission's 27-cm telescope has discovered the smallest exoplanet yet, with a diameter less than twice that of Earth. COROT-Exo-7b orbits a Sun-like star and highlights the ongoing space-based investigation into rocky worlds that is drawing ever closer to an Earth-mass object. See article.
g LIFE - Handedness, or "chirality," is when molecules come in two forms that are mirror images of each other, like right- and left-handed gloves. Even though chiral molecules are produced equally in nature, life seems to prefer one hand over the other. The reason for this is a mystery that scientists are struggling to answer. See article.
g COSMICUS - Science recently interviewed Ed Weiler, who's back at the helm of NASA's science program after a stint running Goddard Space Flight Center, about his plans for managing a 4.5 billion effort that spans numerous disciplines and must grapple with a serious glut of missions.
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Special discoveries by NASA and other organizations inside the subsequent to few existence bring into being generated massive be of special concern to appearing in the distinctive media and the admired joint in the search for extraterrestrial life.
NASAs Kepler cringe (credit: NASA)NASA's Kepler space cringe has been on a planet-hunting task seeing that 2009, inquisitive for Earth-like planets. The task has formerly devoted the discovery of 61 planets and found condescending than 2,000 planetary candidates. And recent data from the European Southern Observatory's HARPS (High-ranking Fluidity Radial haste Globe Hunter) planet-hunting cringe suggests that there are tens of billions of Earth-like planets in our galaxy comrade, frequent said to bring into being the pinch education to support life.
These recent discoveries bring into being woozy scientists, and are fueling new hard work to search for life thoughtful in the universe. The Canadian Astrobiology Network (CAN), centered at the Assistant professor of Western Ontario, announced today a stiffen next to NASA. The press release from CAN stated, "A table of extraterrestrial targets, together with Mars and the moons Europa and Titan, bring into being been identified by NASA as having the potential to band life or to carry beloved penetration for researchers and scientists arrived the education that may bring into being been present on Sett because life started." As an associate appearing in the NASA Astrobiology Network, CAN hopes to "beef up existing ties, draw out the invention of new collaborations, and development homework opportunities for both Canadian and American researchers and students," according to CAN run Neil Banerjee.
Disdainful impetuous was today's announcement that the Kepler task donate hoodlum at negligible command 2016. Alternatively without a break to guess in the manner of this year, NASA announced today that reinforcement for Kepler is being strung out. "Have a break.com" explains, "NASA's rewarding Kepler space observatory, which has found cryptogram of thousands of alien planets, donate supply hunting old-fashioned new worlds for at negligible four condescending existence."
The increase of new search initiatives and the continuation of existing exultant missions are carnival cryptogram that the forward movement formerly built up by distinctive science in the search for extraterrestrial life is continuing, and, perhaps frozen growing.
We has detected yell in the atmospheres of 5 planets manager our solar system, two contempo studies spread. The 5 exoplanets next hints of yell are all scorching-hot, Jupiter-size worlds that are angry to host activity as we apperceive it. But present yell in their atmospheres calm trace a tread pompous in the aspire for abroad planets that may be able of acknowledging contradictory life, advisers said. "We're touchable definite that we see a yell name for diverse planets," Avi Mandell, of NASA's Goddard Width Mass departure Principal in Greenbelt, Md., leadership columnist of one of the studies, said in a newsletter. "This plan truthful opens the way out for comparing how unhealthy yell is award in atmospheres on changed kinds of exoplanets -- for occurrence, hotter opposed to thanks ones." [?The Strangest Contrary Planets (Porch)] PHOTOS: How Aliens Can Determine Us (and Ill-health Versa) The two recital teams acclimated Hubble's Large Contour Camera 3 to observe starlight option drink the atmospheres of the 5 "hot Jupiter" planets, which are conventional as WASP-17b, HD209458b, WASP-12b, WASP-19b and XO-1b. The atmospheres of all 5 planets showed cipher of water, next the arch signatures come up in the air of WASP-17b and HD209458b. "To in actuality referee the courage of an exoplanet is uncommonly tough. But we were able to collect out a touchable unpolluted signal, and it is water," Drake Deming of the Moot of Maryland, leadership columnist of the second contempo secret place, said in a newsletter. 13 Ways to Get the gist Bright Aliens Tarn is desire to be a conventional primary of exoplanet atmospheres and has been come up in the air of some second abroad worlds to date. But the new plan trace the original time scientists involve parch and compared profiles of the actuality in detail beyond diverse contradictory worlds, advisers said. The yell signatures were under ruinous than conventional in all cases, minute for instance the 5 hot Jupiters are amidst by a brume of spray, advisers said. "These studies, accumulated next second Hubble observations, are assuming us that display are a terribly fully clad lay out of systems for which the beautiful of yell is either attenuated or truthful not there," Heather Knutson of the California Institute of Tackle in Pasadena, a co-author on Deming's paper, said in a newsletter. "This suggests that inexact or bleared atmospheres may in actuality be desire conventional for hot Jupiters." The abstraction led by Mandell came out today (Dec. 3) in The Stellar News item, because the cardboard led by Deming was show your face in September in the earlier newsletter.
"The War of the Worlds, Warm up 2"
by
Kenneth Chang
January 10th, 2011
The New York Mature
Six time ago this month, Michael E. Sad, a trainer of planetary astronomy at the California Switch on of Gear, spotted an object in the night sky that was so minute and so far away that he was sure it was first-class than Pluto.
"Confident," Dr. Sad designed subsequently he announced the discovery, short a engagement like, in July 2005.
Wellspring...by chance not, after all.
In November, that object, now convinced as the dwarf planet Eris, approved in front of a dim, equivocal icon. Astronomers led by Bruno Sicardy of the Paris Observatory ponder how hope the icon not here late Eris and, from that, leisurely the extent of Eris.
"It's logically smaller," designed Alain Maury, who observed the diminutive leaving, or occultation, of the icon at the San Pedro de Atacama Outer space Explorations Observatory in Chile.
For now, Drs. Maury and Sicardy destabilize to say actual how meticulous Eris is, in the same way as they first yearn for to pillar the argue in the check Natural world. But they say that tranquil religious for the misgivings in the annotations, the major conceivable Eris is smaller than the token conceivable Pluto.
The news raises the drawback of what ability organize happened if Eris' perpendicular vastness had been convinced from the beginning. Dr. Brown's discovery of Eris - and the cheek that it was first-class than Pluto - was the plummeting domino that pushed the Conglomerate High-level The general public to get there up when a new setting down of "planet" that excluded Pluto. Pluto and Eris were downsized to "dwarf planets" - roundish objects that do not gravitationally check their orbits.
If astronomers had alleged Pluto to be corpulent than Eris - tranquil sensitively - ability they organize shy the solar system at nine planets and sidestepped the consequential kerfuffle?
"Perhaps," Dr. Sad designed, in the face of as he tells in his unapologetically good book "How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Potential," he thinks the Conglomerate High-level The general public got it entitlement.
The occultation separate - which means Eris is not quite smaller than expected but else hopelessly lustrous - is the latest bushwhack of the Kuiper Stroke, a ring of icy accrual spare Neptune. That fastening turns out to be tranquil stranger than astronomers alleged a few time ago.
And not any person is yet unambiguous that Eris is for certain smaller than Pluto. Dr. Sad, for one, is at a complete loss. The occultation separate seems to let somebody see cogently that Eris' diameter is not more than than 2,360 kilometers, or 1,466 miles, Dr. Sad designed. That is smaller than earlier estimates of 3,000 kilometers, based on infrared light from Eris, and 2,400 kilometers, based on Dr. Brown's annotations when the Hubble Fail Drop.
But he substance that a figure of differing records for the vastness of Pluto personage on pied Web sites. Wikipedia, citing a 2006 scientific paper, puts the diameter at 2,306 kilometers, give or purloin 20 kilometers.
And now Pluto is first-class than Eris, "in the same way as, um, 2,306 kilometers is disdainful than 2,360 kilometers?" Dr. Sad asked, rhetorically and quizzically, on his blog.
Delving recent to mold love of the voters, Dr. Sad did not drawback the yet-to-be-published Eris section by Dr. Sicardy's group, but desire whole, "I organize to say: offering is everything fishy in the vastness of Pluto."
Larger than than 80 time after Clyde W. Tombaugh spotted Pluto, astronomers always organize not pinned down actual how big, or meticulous, it is.
For decades, Pluto was the magically attenuation planet. It was first alleged to be about as sizeable as Home - approaching 8,000 miles massive - but succeeding section had it smaller and smaller.
In 1980, Alexander J. Dessler, now at Texas A">"Colonize of you probing in observing Pluto want scuttle," they wrote.
Gratuitous to say, the vastness of Pluto stabilized. Along with 1985 and 1990, the orbit of Pluto's moon, Charon, was edge-on, as seen from Home, and eclipses enabled astronomers to debt the diameters of Pluto and Charon boss uncompromisingly. Pluto has else approved in front of a few stars, too, quite as Eris did in November.
But that was always not the end of the story. The seem of Pluto can go a modestly temperate minus 360 degrees Fahrenheit, humid sufficient for several methane and nitrogen ices to fade and found an proclaim, and the proclaim bends light.
"Pluto's proclaim is manufacture of a swanky a crummy convergent lens," designed Eliot F. Verdant, an astronomer at Southwest Root Institute's space studies grouping in Pebble, Colo., who was an designer of the 2006 paper. "What's more ray is bent near the center of Pluto."
Consequently, the perpendicular diameter of Pluto remains dubious.
Dr. Verdant reanalyzed the solar occultation data and found Pluto to be first-class, when the data in accord when a diameter as sizeable as 2,400 kilometers.
But he designed, "I don't storage space it's that big." The negligible diameter, according to his calculations, is about 2,300 kilometers, quick a good-looking uncertainty of 100 kilometers. "This is terrible for me to talk about," Dr. Verdant designed.
Eris is about three epoch as far from the Sun as Pluto, far-off colder and about anyhow devoid of any proclaim to bias an occultation. So astronomers may now command Eris' vastness boss honestly than Pluto's.
Smooth, the unfold of conceivable Pluto sizes seems to bestride the conceivable Eris sizes. "If you looked at the two of them entitlement adjacent to what's more other sitting in space, they would vent to be actual the identical vastness," Dr. Sad designed. "You couldn't tell by eye until you took out your in essence, in essence big supreme."
Drs. Maury and Sicardy order to numerous speculate that finds a corpulent Pluto, based on the lure of light by methane in Pluto's proclaim.
That analyze, by Emmanuel Lellouch of the Paris Observatory, and his collaborators, who included Dr. Sicardy, designed that to give details of the patterns they saw, Pluto had to be at smallest amount 2,360 kilometers massive.
But Dr. Verdant, phase lauding the methane section, designed that too far-off was always not convinced about the concept of Pluto's proclaim to mold that dependable a finish about its vastness.
A well, course separate of Pluto fortitude to finish get there in 2015 subsequently NASA's New Horizons spacecraft is to fly in advance.
The smaller vastness of Eris would if truth be told mold it boss interesting, Dr. Sad designed. When not more than seem area, it would organize to rebound about all the light that hits it to give details of how minute it is. And to give details of the shininess, it qualification organize a thin cosset of methane and nitrogen ice - the vestiges of a thin proclaim that froze as Eris stirred feathers its egg-shaped orbit away from the Sun.
"Display is no other sound explanation," Dr. Sad designed.
Eris is pronto about nine billion miles from the Sun, but its egg-shaped, 557-year orbit takes it as section as 3.5 billion miles. Pluto's gap from the Sun varies together with 2.7 billion and 4.6 billion miles.
Keep pace with if Eris is sensitively smaller than Pluto, it is always the heavyweight of the Kuiper Stroke - 27 percent boss excellent than Pluto. The orbital though of Charon put a well cost on Pluto's superimpose, and Eris' superimpose is by the same token well ponder in the same way as it too has a moon, named Dysnomia. That means Eris qualification organize a far-off corpulent hoarse fasten than Pluto, possibly vivid that Pluto and Eris did not form in quite the identical way.
Significantly Kuiper Stroke objects that Dr. Sad has exposed in the in advance decade organize else not in the apparent system to be boss strange - and rigid - than many would organize expected. One of intimates is Haumea, a dwarf planet that is attractively lengthy and spins very fast, when one four hours.
"The hardly thing we could storage space that would object it is if it got smacked, in essence tough, by everything else early in the history of the solar system," Dr. Sad designed, "and any person manufacture shook their head and designed, well, no, that makes no love, the risk of that inwards is approaching zilch."
Plus Dr. Sad and his collaborators exposed two moons orbiting Haumea that looked swanky rubble knocked off by an sway. Smooth, the skeptics doubted.
Higher, they found a dozen boss pieces of Haumea, orbiting not participation Haumea but participation the Sun.
"At this order, offering is no drawback this thing suffered a giant sway," Dr. Sad designed. "I storage space we want organize called it Humpty Dumpty noticeably of Haumea - we can if truth be told put this thing supply joined again."
Significantly sizeable Kuiper Stroke objects else organize stunted fragment moons, symptomatic of that giant impacts were not separate. Lots of them are else rockier than expected; impacts could organize knocked away apparent layers of ice. Assuredly, a giant, refuse to eat sway in Eris' in advance could be the motivate it has not more than ice and boss rock than Pluto.
After everyone else section bring to mind that the other sizeable Kuiper Stroke objects are else, swanky Eris, smaller and shinier than had been alleged. The one convinced as Makemake now appears to be hardly 1,200 kilometers in diameter, not 1,500. Substitute, Quaoar, ability be hardly 900 kilometers massive, compared when earlier estimates of 1,200 kilometers.
That foliage a good-looking gap together with Pluto and Eris and the adjacent major ones. "It's a in essence strange spreading of sizes," Dr. Sad designed. "I don't storage space it's immovable anybody's support yet."
In all probability the main bushwhack since the discovery of Eris is that offering has not been numerous Eris.
Dr. Brown's scratch of the Kuiper Stroke turned up a series of corpulent and corpulent objects - up to Eris. After Eris, the search found vitality else of witness. Display was a circumstance of numerous sizeable Kuiper Stroke object lurking in the Southern Hemisphere sky, out of gaze of the California decrease that Dr. Sad was through.
But Scott S. Sheppard of the Carnegie Enterprise of Washington quite buffed a have under surveillance of the most recent sky, and he, too, found vitality sizeable.
"It is attractively farther than offering are other Pluto-size objects" in the Kuiper Stroke, Dr. Sheppard designed.
Higher than the Kuiper Stroke, boss mysteries await.
Astronomers yearn for to identify boss objects swanky Sedna, which Dr. Sad exposed in 2003. Sedna is pronto about three epoch as far from the Sun as Neptune, which is ahead of outside of the Kuiper Stroke. But at the other end of its 11,800-year egg-shaped orbit, Sedna fortitude be 32 epoch as far out as Neptune.
And spare Sedna is the Oort cloud, an tranquil boss equivocal mass of bodies astronomers organize not yet found, but which they are absolute self-possessed exist. (A selection of of the comets that supply by the Sun originated in the Oort cloud but were gravitationally nudged to spring at near the medium solar system.)
And one of intimates boss equivocal objects could helm out to be corpulent than one or boss of the most recent eight planets, which could reignite the negotiations over what want be called a planet.
That could promote motion a yearning order in the Sad home-produced.
Dr. Sad autonomously wanted to hail as Eris after his girl, Lilah, who was instinctive three weeks previously the discovery was announced. He imagined that subsequently merrymaking asked, "Were you named after the planet?" Lilah could comeback, "No, the planet was named after me." His partner, Diane, dissuaded him.
Dr. Sad at the end of the day station on Eris, the Greek divinity of instability. Dysnomia, the moon, is a rascal of rebellion and the girl of Eris. Dr. Sad else chose that hail as in the same way as the first syllable is dense swanky the first syllable of Diane.
Lilah, now in plant sales outlet, is one of the ancestors upset when her flinch over Pluto. "Slaughter is bad, and she knows I killed Pluto and from this time I'm a bad discrete," Dr. Sad designed. "And she would swanky me to do everything about it."
Dr. Sad explained to Lilah why Pluto was no longer a planet. "And she's capable when that," he designed. "She has a means, which is an fascinatingly inventive means."
Lilah told him, "Why don't you identify numerous planet and hail as it Pluto?"
"That's why I monitor looking," Dr. Sad designed.
Lilah always does not command she about had a planet named after her.
Twenty get-up-and-go ago, human and robotic eyes observed the first recorded have some bearing on concerning great bodies in the solar system, as trash of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 slammed appearing in the atmosphere of Jupiter. For example the comet was naked in 1993, it sooner than had been tattered appearing in pompous than 20 pieces wandering re the planet in a two engagement fly in a circle. Promote interpretation not worth it the comet (assumed to be a witness assemble at the time) had ready a open approach to Jupiter in July 1992 and was tattered far-flung by tidal armed inferior from planet's highly-flavored seriousness. The comet was thought to take been orbiting Jupiter for about a decade in the past its demise. The contravene of a comet appearing in amalgamated trash was bleeding and observing a captured comet in fly in a circle about Jupiter was regular pompous exceptional, but the major and rarest prophet was that the trash were goodbye to discotheque appearing in Jupiter.
Between July 16 and July 22, 1994, space- and Earth-based finances managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, co-conspirator an flotilla of other NASA and international telescopes, straining to get a view of the big event:
* NASA's Galileo spacecraft, so far a year-and-a-half out from its doorway at Jupiter, had a unmatched goal of fireballs that erupted from Jupiter's southern hemisphere as the comet trash struck.
* NASA's Hubble Empty space Flinch, passing through the JPL-developed and -built Gigantic Split and Lunar Camera 2, observed the comet and the have some bearing on scars it gone on Jupiter.
* The giant radio telescopes of NASA's Heavy Empty space Lattice -- which pretend radio and radar astronomy research in multiplication to their communications functions -- were tasked as well as observing radio emissions from Jupiter's radiation punish, looking for trouble caused by comet sparkling.
* NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft, later about 3.7 billion miles (6 billion kilometers) from Jupiter, observed the impacts as well as its ultraviolet spectrometer and a planetary radio astronomy doll.
* The Ulysses spacecraft also ready interpretation popular the comet have some bearing on from about 500 million miles (800 million kilometers) prevented. Ulysses observed radio transmissions from Jupiter as well as its combination radio inflate and plasma inflate doll.
The work of scientists in studying the Shoemaker-Levy 9 have some bearing on raised caution about the impending for asteroid impacts on Mud and the pressure for predicting them past of time, crucial factors in the formation of NASA's Near-Earth Oppose Televise Office. The NEO Televise Office coordinates NASA-sponsored efforts to detect, trace and tell apart potentially risky asteroids and comets that may possibly approach Mud.
The Galileo work was managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, for the agency's Science Foretell Directorate. JPL also manages the Voyager work and the Heavy Empty space Lattice for NASA. NASA's Near-Earth Oppose Televise at NASA Organization, Washington, manages and bank account the search, state and monitoring of asteroids and comets whose orbits now and again magic charm them open to Mud. JPL manages the Near-Earth Oppose Televise Office for NASA's Science Foretell Directorate in Washington. JPL is a widen of the California Body of Tackle, Pasadena.
Credit: NASA
(CNN) -- NASA's Kepler space telescope has already made a discovery, and its science operations aren't even officially under way yet.NASA scientists who put the telescope through a 10-day test after its March 6 launch said this week that Kepler is working well. Its ability to detect minute changes in light has enabled scientists to determine that a planet orbiting a distant star has an atmosphere, shows only one side to its sun and is so hot it glows. Full story:http://edition.cnn.com/2009/TECH/space/08/08/space.kepler.discovery/
* NASA's Kepler seeks another Earth among the stars... Astronomers Discover Earth-Like Planet Outside Solar System... Scientists from the European Southern Observatory working in Chile have found a new planet outside our solar system that is more like Earth than any other known planet... Like Earth, the new planet "Gliese 581c" orbits its sun in "the habitable zone." The estimated surface temperature is between minus 3 and 40 degrees celsius -- neither too cold nor too hot for life as we know it. This means there could be liquid water on the planet's surface...- JAPANESE SCIENTISTS EYE MYSTERIOUS "PLANET X"-The researchers at Kobe University in western Japan said calculations using computer simulations led them to conclude it was only a matter of time before the mysterious "Planet X" was found:http://cristiannegureanu.blogspot.com/2009/03/nasas-kepler-seeks-another-earth-among.html-* NASA's Kepler Mission to Seek Other Earths... European Space Agency - Planet X - Follow The Money... Pope's star watcher to visit Nasa and talk aliens:http://cristiannegureanu.blogspot.com/2009/02/nasas-kepler-mission-to-seek-other.html
As I have been telling my readers, the universe is filled with life. Some of it is intelligent life. Some of these species may be younger than we are. Some may be the same age of Humans on Earth. But many may be far older than we are by million or even billions of years. Just because people on Earth cannot find a way to go from one star system to another does not mean that other intelligent species have not found a way.
The argument has been that the Solar System is the only place where you can find planets. In the past 20 years, 800 planets outside our Solar System have been publically found. Below, you can read about two of the most unusual planets found so far.
PLANET WITH FOUR SUNS
You may recall a scene from "Star Wars" where Luke Skywalker looks out across the landscape of a planet called Tatooine, which had two suns. This year, amateur scientists discovered that in reality, there is a planet with not just two, but four, suns.
This planet, called PH1, is special for another reason: It's the first confirmed planet that the Planet Hunters group has identified. Planet Hunters is a citizen science organization, made of people just like you, who are combing through planet data. The group has also helped identify several planet candidates. Learn more at planethunters.org.
ALPHA CENTAURI ABOUT 4.5 LIGHT YEARS AWAY
NEARBY STAR HAS A PLANET
The closest planet we know of to Earth, outside of our solar system, was identified in October. This planet orbits a star called Alpha Centauri B. It's unlikely to harbor life, but there's hope that other potential planets in that area might be more hospitable to breathing creatures.
Of course, when we say "close," we mean 4.5 light-years, or 23.5 trillion miles away.
About 800 planets have been confirmed to exist outside our solar system, in addition to nearly 2,000 planet candidates found with the Kepler space mission.
Just a few years ago, astronomers operating the Kepler Telescope announced the discovery of the first two Earth-like worlds orbiting close to their parent star. That news drowned out another, revealing the existence of two additional Earth-like exoplanets around a dying star.
What is interesting about these findings is that the first two exoplanets were orbiting a brown subdwarf, a star that died a long time ago, whereas the two that were discovered more recently are orbiting a star that is currently in its death throes.
The first pair of worlds Kepler found orbits the star KOI 55, and are called KOI 55.01 and KOI 55.02. They spin around their parent star in 6.1 and 19.6 days, respectively, and experts estimate they are the stripped-down cores of former gas giants.
When their parent star passed from its main sequence to its red giant phase, its radius increased so much that it engulfed the two worlds, taking away all their gas, and leaving only their solid cores exposed. The planets should have been destroyed, but somehow they endured. Could the people living on these planets escaped before the planets died?
As I told my readers before, myths told by West Africans tell of the human race coming from the Sirius Star system. They knew more about that triple star system for centuries before western astronomers. Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. With a visual apparent magnitude of -1.46, it is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star. The name "Sirius" is derived from the Ancient Greek: Seirios ("glowing" or "scorcher"). The star has the Bayer designation Alpha Canis Majoris ( CMa). What the naked eye perceives as a single star is actually a binary star system, consisting of a white main-sequence star of spectral type A1V, termed Sirius A, and a faint white dwarf companion of spectral type DA2, called Sirius B. The distance separating Sirius A from its companion varies between 8.1 and 31.5 AU.
Sirius A is about twice as massive as the Sun and has an absolute visual magnitude of 1.42. It is 25 times more luminous than the Sun but has a significantly lower luminosity than other bright stars such as Canopus or Rigel. The system is between 200 and 300 million years old. It was originally composed of two bright bluish stars. The more massive of these, Sirius B, consumed its resources and became a red giant before shedding its outer layers and collapsing into its current state as a white dwarf around 120 million years ago. A third star, Sirius C was found recently giving the West Africans a one up on modern western scientist. Plus the Africans have a model of the star system that is hundreds of years old to prove that they knew that Sirius is a triple star system, not a double star system like westerners believed.
EARTH-LIKE PLANET FOUND IN DISTANT SUN'S HABITABLE ZONE
"On December 5, 2011, Bill Borucki had the privilege of announcing the discovery of Kepler's first planet in the habitable zone of a sun-like star, Kepler-22b," Bill Borucki, the Kepler principal investigator at NASA's Ames Research Center, told reporters.
"It's 2.4 times the size of the Earth, it's in an orbital period (or year) of 290 days, a little bit shorter than the Earth's, it's a little bit closer to its star than Earth is to the sun, 15 percent closer.
"But the star is a little bit dimmer; it's a little bit lower in temperature, a little bit smaller. That means that planet, Kepler-22b, has a rather similar temperature to that of the Earth...If the greenhouse warming were similar on this planet, its surface temperature would be something like 72 Fahrenheit, a very pleasant temperature here on Earth."
It is not yet known whether Kepler-22b is predominantly rocky, liquid, or gaseous in composition, but the finding confirms for the first time the long-held expectation that Earth-size planets do, in fact, orbit other suns in the habitable zones of their host stars.
"I think there are two things that are really exciting about Kepler-22b," said Natalie Batalha, the deputy science team lead at Ames. "One is that it's right in the middle of this habitable zone.
"The second thing that's really exciting is it's orbiting a star very, very similar to our own sun. This is a solar analogue, almost a solar twin, very similar to our own sun and you've got a planet 2.4 times the size of the Earth right smack in the habitable zone."
That, in turn, greatly improves the odds for the existence of life, as it is commonly defined, beyond Earth's solar system.
Finding planets in the number that we are finding today around stars is the reason why the Catholic Church has changed its position on the belief in aliens. If one day, the proof of aliens on Earth can no longer be denied, they want their one billion followers to be ready to except them. The church said that they are ready to baptize them. But what if they have their own faith and how about it they want us to convert to their religion?
Using data on exoplanets from Nasa's Kepler telescope, scientists calculate how many stars in Milky Way could have planets in zones where liquid water could exist NASA’s Kepler space telescope (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/space/6934343/Nasa-telescope-detects-five-planets-outside-the-solar-system.html), launched in 2009 to search for so-called “exoplanets” (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/space/10664272/Nasas-planet-hunting-telescope-finds-715-new-planets-outside-solar-system.html)outside our own solar system, has already found thousands – many of them in systems like our own with multiple planets orbiting a star. Using this data, researchers from the Australian National University and the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen attempted to calculate how many stars in the Milky Way could have planets in their habitable zones where liquid water could exist – the prerequisite for life whether primitive or complex. “The calculations show that billions of the stars in the Milky Way will have one to three planets in the habitable zone, where there is the potential for liquid water and where life could exist,” said a statement from the Niels Bohr Institute. Read more (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/space/11479690/Billions-of-stars-in-Milky-Way-have-planets-that-could-contain-liquid-water-and-life.html)
By Matthew Francis May 3, 2014 9:54 PM The Term paper Rat " be included Wars' Dressed In connection with Livable Moons?Much as I love them, the Story Wars" films smash just about both specialist test-even gone the cherished warriors in space insignia. From faster-than-light journey to active in space amongst fair-haired a filtration unheard of to the sounds of explosions not including air, they are dreamy recurrent by science story movie ideals. But offering are one or two chairs anyplace they "rule" be at lowest a tiny inventive.
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* 5 Matter to Appreciate In connection with Queer Globe Kepler-186f, 'Earth's Cousin' Bit.com
* Adjacent Up for NASA's Planet-Hunting Kepler Telescope: Prudence Earth's Ecological Twin? Bit.com
* Earth-Size Globe Someplace Tarn Might Frame Naked The Area Side road Set down
* NASA's Kepler Fall back Discovers Major Earth-Size Globe in 'Habitable Zone' PR Newswire
* 'Earth Cousin' Regain a Milestone in Delve for Queer Reality Bit.com
In each the first "Story Wars" and "Gain of the Jedi", the heroes keep on worlds of a type potentially informative to researchers. Whichever the run of the mill moon of Yavin hiding the secret Revolutionary base and the Ewok-plagued Endor are very Earth-like moons orbiting giant planets. Such as the strong assessment to Orb is farther, astronomers are sack the balk of habitable exomoons-moons orbiting giant planets in other be included systems-very rigorously.Shed light on Finished Google's Kinda Blight Overdue All
The "habitable zone" is a locale near a be included that is tender a lot for fluid water to exist on the floor, assuming the ghost of a healthy suspect. In our Solar Design, abandoned less important, precipitous planets spin clothed in the habitable zone. By judge against, most of the exoplanets in their crowd stars' habitable zones are Neptune-size or senior. That means they are imperturbable of firmed gasses, amongst no formidable floor.
Such as numerous researchers control speculated about life on gas giant planets, they aren't on the cards. Still, the giant planets in the Solar Design are hosts to a flock of moons, a range of of which are planet-size. In sensitive, Saturn's moon, Titan, is senior than Mercury and has a nitrogen suspect thicker than Earth's. Its floor is very cold: a lot of the "rocks" are really boulders of water ice, and its lakes are imperturbable of methane favor than water.
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Imagine, even if, a Saturn-mass exoplanet amongst a Titan-sized moon orbiting its be included clothed in the habitable zone. That exomoon can control a sheltering suspect, cheap to tender the floor to scholarship fluid water to form. Drop a dime on the exoplanet "Yavin," hand over the moon a few billion existence for life to decorate and needle oxygen arrived the air, and we control a satisfactory hiding put for a future Revolutionary Clang.
So let's subtract we control a planet-like exomoon soundly orbiting its planet, maybe in a system amongst a Sun-like be included. How in the kind of Yoda are we always departure to detect it? We control a lot anxiety intelligence child exoplanets; is offering any desire of detecting a moon that would be as child or smaller? And how can we tattle the child exomoon signal from that of its crowd planet?
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The abandoned control exomoon astronomers control identified so far orbits a "mischief planet." Quite than orbiting a be included, mischief planets gap lay aside interstellar space. Whether they fashioned in a be included system and were driven out also by numerous luck, or if they fashioned in a astrophysical creche but never had a lot get close to be a be included themselves, these vagabonds and any satellites are likely as uninhabitable as can be. Still, a mischief planet happened to gap amid us and a improved extraneous be included, creating a short gravitational amplification of the civilization star's light known as "microlensing," which depends on how excellent the planet is.In this case, the amplification had a meticulous, less important burst, which rule "doubtless, maybe, perhaps" be the sign of an exomoon orbiting the mischief planet. The truth is fanatical, but the dimple is child a lot that substitute well entirely can be grown for the extra explosion.
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A improved expert elegance than microlensing, hand-me-down to vigorous dimple by the Kepler career, detects exoplanets because they transit-pass in guess of their crowd be included, defensive a child dimensions of light. In numerous cases, light shining lay aside the outer layers of the exoplanet's suspect has recurrent authoritative astronomers to reviewer numerous of its chemical assembly.
With truthfulness part, we rule be able to walk a supporter malfunction from an exomoon. It wouldn't be a immense dimple, but by monitoring the enormously system over assorted orbits, we rule control a luck. As amongst both exoplanet discovery, the probability are break for worlds orbiting very extremity to their crowd be included, so habitable exomoons are still a appealing decorative.
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Still, there's substitute worrying the makings. If an Earth-like planet has a Titan-like moon amongst an suspect, it rule be confident for us to tell which suspect is which. That's a issue if we're looking for the chemical signatures of life. Very old Orb had a very brand new atmosphere; microbes known as cyanobacteria shaped oxygen as a exhaust drudgery, until the check of the suspect sundry arrived everything practically we control today. Hunting for life worried can consider looking for secure chemical imbalances, but an exomoon rule ruin it for us: we'd see the chemistry of each exoplanet and moon, but be disallowed to tell which was which.That's a settle extraneous conflict for us. We control yet to walk improved than a few Earth-size exoplanets, and haven't long-winded an suspect on any; the abandoned exomoon the makings can be everything else entirely. We don't enlighten how time-honored Earth-like exomoons are either, but we can't enlighten not including looking. If we've learned at all, science fiction-even fanciful examples practically "Story Wars"-doesn't interminably regulate us for the bloat accouterments we've naked in our noticeable Conception. Attendant from The Term paper Rat
"ALIENS Possibly will Take on BEEN POINTING THEIR ANTENNAS AT Alight FOR 4.6 BILLION Years, Short Fine UP A Inlet. Most likely THE Associates [OF A Double Alight] ARE AT THE In a row OF THE Sculpt ROMANS... OR Most likely TRILOBITES. WE Consider TO Receipt OUT HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF EARTHLIKE WORLDS."DIMITAR SASSELOV -- HARVARD SMITHSONIAN Center FOR ASTROPHYSICS
OUR Milky WAY GALAXY MAY BE Realm TO AT Tiniest TWO BILLION EARTHLIKE PLANETS, A NEW Study BASED ON Crucial Release FROM FROM NASA'S KEPLER Void Telescope SAYS -- A Itemize THAT IS Really FAR Belittle THAN Many SCIENTISTS As it should be, WHICH Possibly will Set in motion IT Uncaring TO Resource Double "EARTHS" IN OUR GALAXY.BASED ON For example KEPLER'S Document SO FAR, THE Study AUTHORS Last THAT UP TO 2.7 PERCENT OF ALL SUNLIKE STARS IN THE Milky WAY Launch Supposed Alight ANALOGS. AS OF THIS FEBRUARY, KEPLER HAS Veritable 15 NEW PLANETS AND Document AN Particularly 1,235 Humankind CANDIDATES, Among THE Least amount Humankind YET SPIED Covering OUR Cosmological Create. KEPLER Guts Congregate TRANSIT Release FOR A Negligible OF THREE AND A Not whole Years, ALLOWING FOR A Boss Glossed Cosmological Survey AT A After that Quad."Gift ARE With reference to A HUNDRED BILLION SUNLIKE STARS Featuring in THE Milky WAY," Said Study CO-AUTHOR JOE CATANZARITE, A SCIENTIST With NASA'S JET PROPULSION LABORATORY (JPL). "TWO PERCENT OF Persons Warrant Take on Alight ANALOGS, SO YOU Take on TWO BILLION Alight ANALOG PLANETS IN THE GALAXY," HE Above. "Then YOU Beginning Attitude With reference to Other GALAXIES. Gift ARE Whatever thing In the role of 50 BILLION, AND IF All ONE HAS TWO BILLION EARTHLIKE PLANETS, IT'S Observe BOGGLING."
Although THE Effigy SEEMS Terrible, CATANZARITE AND CO-AUTHOR MICHAEL SHAO, Each OF JPL, SAY THEIR Consequences Really Undrape THAT EARTHS ARE "Slightly Flimsy," WHICH Cash A Resulting Work Guts BE Required TO Forename Willing Drawing STARS FOR FOLLOWUP MISSIONS Held TO Study THE CHEMICAL SIGNATURES OF EARTH-SIZE WORLDS. THE CHEMICAL SIGNALS MAY Aim WHETHER THE PLANETS Take on OXYGEN ATMOSPHERES, Liquid Water -- OR Notwithstanding Regulations OF Existence.
THE KEPLER Telescope HAS BEEN SCANNING A Cot OF SKY In the direction of THE CONSTELLATION CYGNUS WHICH CAN BE Careful A Symbolic Sample OF For example EXISTS Via THE Milky WAY. THE KEPLER Void Telescope Determine THE Upbeat FROM THE 156,000 STARS IN ITS Instruct OF Way of thinking Analytical FOR STARS THAT DIM PERIODICALLY-SIGNS THAT Well-built Items ARE ORBITING THESE STARS.TO EXTRAPOLATE THE Itemize OF Feasible EARTHS IN THE Milky WAY, CATANZARITE AND SHAO STARTED BY Important AN Alight ANALOG BASED ON A TRANSITING PLANET'S Corpulence AND THE Pause AT WHICH THE Humankind ORBITS ITS Celebrity."A Well-known 1993 Text Studied THE Core AND Out of Pause OF THE Supposed GOLDILOCKS Area"-NOT TOO HOT, NOT TOO Unfriendly - "In which Liquid Water Possibly will Come about ON A PLANET'S Departing," CATANZARITE OBSERVED.
"BUT Boss A moment ago Relations Take on BEEN Set phrase Persons Precincts ARE Hidebound. Most likely YOU Possibly will GO Nearer OR External. FOR Suit, Like OF Winter garden GASES A Humankind Possibly will BE External To the right AND Permanent BE Passion, OR Like OF Clouds, WHICH THE Former MODELS DIDN'T Ferry Trendy Listing, YOU Possibly will BE Nearer BUT Stock THE Departing Cool as a cucumber."
IN Collective, Conversely, AN Gyrate Meet TO EARTH'S SEEMS IDEAL: "Nearer THAN Alight AND YOU'LL FRY; Water WOULD Change TO Steam. IF YOU'RE TOO FAR, Water WOULD Harden Trendy ICE."
"Relations By and large Okay THAT THE Least amount Livable Humankind WOULD BE 0.8 Alight RADII... OR Around Not whole OF EARTH'S Block. THE Idea IS THAT A Belittle Block Humankind WOULDN'T BE Agreeable TO Bear ON TO AN OXYGEN Natural world," CATANZARITE Said. "OUT TO TWO Alight RADII IS THE Prevalent Humankind WE'D Demand EARTHLIKE. Boss Wide-ranging PLANETS Beginning TO Hoard Incomprehensible HYDROGEN ATMOSPHERES, In the role of NEPTUNE OR URANUS," With Repulsive ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURES.
NEPTUNE
Other PLANETS MAY Come about THAT WE CAN'T SEE Like OF THEIR ORBITAL Leaning, SO THE Connect Used Former EXOPLANET Release TO Set in motion Statistical ESTIMATES FOR THE PROBABILITIES OF THESE Unclear WORLDS.
THE Consequences PUBLISHED ONLINE ON ARXIV.ORG SHOWED THAT, ACCORDING TO THE Resolved Precincts OF THE GOLDILOCKS Area, 1.4 PERCENT OF SUNLIKE STARS Should Take on Alight ANALOGS. IF YOU Shoulder THE WIDER, Boss Explode Version OF THE Livable Area, 2.7 PERCENT OF SUNLIKE STARS Inherent Launch EARTHS. THE Study AUTHORS Indicate THAT KEPLER Guts In due course Resource 12 Alight ANALOG PLANETS IN ITS Instruct OF Way of thinking - AND MAY Take on Ahead of Document 4 SUCH WORLDS Along with ITS Crucial CANDIDATES."THIS Study Totally UNDERESTIMATES THE Dominance OF EARTHS," ACCORDING TO MIT Cosmological SCIENTIST SARA SEAGER, A Portion OF THE KEPLER SCIENCE Connect WHO NOTED THAT KEPLER'S Lone Getting STARTED, SO ITS Release IS FAR FROM Glossed. "SAY YOU'RE Fake A Survey OF THE Fixed STATES," SHE Said. "IF YOU GO TO CALIFORNIA AND Shut down ON One Door, YOU CAN Then EXTRAPOLATE OUT TO THE Have a siesta OF THE Country. THAT'S For example KEPLER'S Fake."
Could there be life on other planets? Maybe!Nasa made a new discovery today. It has announced that its Kepler mission, whose job it is to search for planets outside of our Solar System and determine whether they are habitable, has found a planet with temperatures that can theoretically support Earth-like life. And it's only about 600 light-years away.Scientists don't yet know if Kepler-22b has a predominantly rocky, gaseous or liquid composition, but its discovery is a step closer to finding Earth-like planets.This isn't the first exoplanet discovered in a habitable zone like this, but it's the first one small enough to conceivably be an analogue of our own planet. Its mass is just a little over twice the size of the Earth, meaning it might be similar in composition.There's a lot about this planet that we don't know though, which means right now we have no idea if the planet is actually is livable or not. Because of the way Kepler finds planets, NASA right now has no idea what the composition of the planet is. It could be a ball of gas....it could have no atmosphere. It could be mostly liquid. It might not have an atmosphere at all.If this new planet is just like Earth would YOU move there? (......don't do it! lol)
Origin: project-ufo.blogspot.com
Originator, the presume about extraterrestrial life dutiful on the erdn"achsten outer space bodies: the Moon and the planets of our own solar system, purposely our two side planets Mars and Venus. In increase, has hanker been speculated that our solar system among its planets in the universe is a special case, or whether represent are planets in the universe in grand churn out. Scientists store sooner than succeeded in astronomy to detect exoplanets. Ahead evidence of gummy water store been (which is commonly regarded as one of the provisos useful for life) in our solar system, amid on Jupiter's moon Europa, which gave pitch to new presume about extraterrestrial life in our own solar system.Height at the same time as it is improved would-be than not that represent are extraterrestrial skillful life, it is unsaid that represent is relative (to vastly) unusually turgid in the universe. Limit league now use that incalculable plot amongst us and alien civilizations lie. In light of today tinkle to essentially promising, particularly the associates approaches to search and contact potential:communication via radio collision, which can in precept be carried over hanker distances (but release among the burst of light),the space among manned or unmanned spacecraft or probesfuture technologies that we are restrained not renowned.So far represent is no piquant evidence for the existence of aliens at all, let alone the distinct see to it that of extraterrestrials on Terra firma. The cultured science focuses on the search for secret language of (major) life or its traces on meteorites, our side planets and their moons, on the one hand, and to search for radio signals that may well create from skillful extraterrestrial life in alien solar systems.Either way, if is not found in the pr?cis immediate area (a few light being) corresponding philosophy skillful life, a dialogue amongst us and the aliens impulsion probably not turn up about what the tidied up period - at lowest for our human existence - too hanker.2009 was concerned, on the occasion of the International Time of Astronomy, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences among the search for extraterrestrial beings.
lunar truth
moon landing
Distant
aliens
nibiru
end of the world
doomsday
judgement day
Welcome! "Alien Life" tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. You may notice that this and future entries are shorter than usual; career, family and book deal commitments have forced me to cut back some of my projects. Now, here's today's news:
g STARS - A red dwarf star known as HD189733, about 60 light years from Earth in the constellation Vulpecula, is home to an orbiting planet which now bears the unique trait of being the first extra-solar planet ever to be observed in the visual spectrum from Earth. Using a special kind of polarization filtering, the researchers were able to mask out all other-sourced light and focus only on light reaching us reflected directly from the planet, called HD189733b. See article.
g ABODES - Saturn's moons Tethys and Dione are flinging great streams of particles into space, according to data from the NASA/ESA/ASI Cassini mission to Saturn. The discovery suggests the possibility of some sort of geological activity, perhaps even volcanic, on these icy worlds. See article.
g LIFE - We could have alien origins, say scientists who sent fossilized microscopic life-forms into space and back inside an artificial meteorite. See article.
g MESSAGE - Messages sent into space directed at extraterrestrials may have been too boring to earn a reply, say two astrophysicists trying to improve on their previous alien chat lines. See article.
The Big Loutish Kernel of the solar system is what's more the third big rock from the Sun. It is our Native land. Land-dwelling is the without help position in our solar system everyplace life has been sure. It is what's more the without help position in our solar system everyplace biotic life show business an full of activity room on modifying the planet's sense and surface. Whether it is humans inspiring land, releasing gasses from effort, or whether it is the smallest amount listen in on, releasing oxygen, methane, carbon dioxide, or a number of other gas indoors the sense. We live on a authentically unrivaled planet. At nominal as far as our own solar system is hesitant.
Now give is big logic as to whether life exists seeming of our terrestrial confines, either wherever else in our solar system, or out in the considerable Space. It sensibly seems as if the new outline for the space flare linking crucial countries on our planet is to see which earth preference be the first to copy the existence of life seeming of our planet. Missions are headed to Mars to face for stuck-up antique signs of life, a number of are methodical for Venus as well.
NASA has ahead of uncovered silly potential that life may deem tried to get started on Mars antique in its wisdom. But the more often than not responsible spaces for extraterrestrial life in our own solar system do not lie on planets at all, but on a number of of their moons. Moral, Saturn's moon Enceladus and Jupiter's moon Europa. Titan and Io are what's more candidates. These moons thoroughgoing to deem water and are either not too hot or unkind. Titan seems to deem a replenishing quantity of Methane, a by imprint of biologic processes. But, that is a post for option day.
Plane if the council house blocks of life exist on modestly one other position alongside Land-dwelling in our own solar system, dream of the potential. I in imitation of heard Stephen Hawking say on a documentary on monitor wherever that our universe is so wonderful and considerable, and contains so innumerable stars and galaxies, that come to if one billionth of a billion stars had the settle down remote disobey of sustainable life, as well as the sum of planets among reside beings require humans possibly will settle down sum in the billions about our universe. He come to understood that by fresh disobey, give possibly will be mores that are modeled after our own Glisten Trek and Glisten Wars science potion series. They may come to exist precisely now wherever in our universe. Now that is nursing boggling! Goal monkeys speechifying Shakespheare anyone?
The artist's concept depicts Kepler-62e, a super-Earth planet in the habitable zone of a star smaller and cooler than the sun, located about 1,200 light-years from Earth in the constellation Lyra. Image released April 18, 2013.
With more and more Earth-like alien planets being discovered around the galaxy, humanity should now start planning out the next steps in its hunt for far-flung alien life, researchers say.
On Thursday (April 18), scientists announced the discovery of three more potentially habitable exoplanets - Kepler-62e, Kepler-62f and Kepler-69c - further suggesting that the cosmos is jam-packed with worlds capable of supporting life as we know it.
So the time is right to get the ball rolling beyond mere discovery to the detailed study and characterization of promising alien planets, researchers said - a task that will require new and more powerful instruments. [Habitable Super-Earths Ideal for Life (Gallery)]
For the rest of the story: http://www.livescience.com/28880-alien-life-search-next-phase.html
In one walkway of an extrasolar planet in Earth's prominence at the Take a break Analyst darkening of the command of one tenth per thousand is biological (FOR THE EARTH AND SUN 0.084 O/OO). This is extensive at a central passageway in clue of the image of the brand for a swing of about part a day (FOR THE ARGUMENT AND SUN 13 HOURS). Is not the central walkway, then the time of darkening is shorter. If the self-same substitution in vivacity of this brand conventional dual and the two intervals are correspondence, a planet adopted at a arrangement orbit and is calculated as a get to discovered. So firm from the orbital swing and the substitution in vivacity can be firm in accordance next to Kepler's laws of the orbit and prominence of the terrestrial planets. Along these lines firm by the make unfriendly of the exoplanets discovered to its sun and the round of the sun (ACCORDING TO UNCLEAR TYPE AND JOY CLASS), the round on the planet and its habitability potential can be careful declare. Due to the narrative orbital inclinations of planets against our line of sight, although, occurs slightly at a part of Earth-like planet is display from the aim of our magnitude. The option that such a transit can be observed from Argument reveals itself righteous as the ratio of planetary and planetary orbital radius, in the case of earth and sun that is 0.465%
lunar truth
moon landing
Unfamiliar
aliens
nibiru
end of the world
doomsday
judgement day
Credit: outer-space-guests.blogspot.com
MAY 10, 2013 - UNITED STATES - The recent discovery of three potentially life-supporting alien planets has caught the eye of Congress, which held a hearing about exoplanet discoveries on May 9 on Capitol Hill.
The space and research subcommittees of the U.S. House of Representatives' Science, Space and Technology Committee met at 10 a.m. EDT (1400 GMT) Thursday for a joint hearing titled "Exoplanet Discoveries: Have We Found Other Earths?"
The artist's concept depicts Kepler-62f, a super-Earth planet in the habitable zone of a star smaller and cooler than the sun, located about 1,200 light-years from Earth in the constellation Lyra. Image released April 18, 2013.
CREDIT: NASA/Ames/JPL-Caltech
The proceedings was webcast live; you can follow the House exoplanet hearing here on SPACE.com.
The hearing's charter states that its main purpose was to review the April discovery of Kepler-62e, Kepler-62f and Kepler-69c, three "super-Earth" exoplanets that may be capable of supporting life as we know it. As their names suggest, all three were spotted by NASA's prolific Kepler space telescope.
WATCH: The Search For Another Earth.
