So now that we have found an Earth like planet...
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ThaChozenWun
Members Posts: 9,390
How long will it take, and if it's possible, should we go to it to observe and test whether or not it's inhabited, inhabital, and has enough oxygen to sustain life, and potentially, be a new home for people from Earth.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100929/ap_on_sc/us_sci_new_earths
WASHINGTON – Astronomers say they have for the first time spotted a planet beyond our own in what is sometimes called the Goldilocks zone for life: Not too hot, not too cold. Juuuust right.
Not too far from its star, not too close. So it could contain liquid water. The planet itself is neither too big nor too small for the proper surface, gravity and atmosphere.
It's just right. Just like Earth.
"This really is the first Goldilocks planet," said co-discoverer R. Paul Butler of the Carnegie Institution of Washington.
The new planet sits smack in the middle of what astronomers refer to as the habitable zone, unlike any of the nearly 500 other planets astronomers have found outside our solar system. And it is in our galactic neighborhood, suggesting that plenty of Earth-like planets circle other stars.
Finding a planet that could potentially support life is a major step toward answering the timeless question: Are we alone?
Scientists have jumped the gun before on proclaiming that planets outside our solar system were habitable only to have them turn out to be not quite so conducive to life. But this one is so clearly in the right zone that five outside astronomers told The Associated Press it seems to be the real thing.
"This is the first one I'm truly excited about," said Penn State University's Jim Kasting. He said this planet is a "pretty prime candidate" for harboring life.
Life on other planets doesn't mean E.T. Even a simple single-cell bacteria or the equivalent of shower mold would shake perceptions about the uniqueness of life on Earth.
But there are still many unanswered questions about this strange planet. It is about three times the mass of Earth, slightly larger in width and much closer to its star — 14 million miles away versus 93 million. It's so close to its version of the sun that it orbits every 37 days. And it doesn't rotate much, so one side is almost always bright, the other dark.
Temperatures can be as hot as 160 degrees or as frigid as 25 degrees below zero, but in between — in the land of constant sunrise — it would be "shirt-sleeve weather," said co-discoverer Steven Vogt of the University of California at Santa Cruz.
It's unknown whether water actually exists on the planet, and what kind of atmosphere it has. But because conditions are ideal for liquid water, and because there always seems to be life on Earth where there is water, Vogt believes "that chances for life on this planet are 100 percent."
The astronomers' findings are being published in Astrophysical Journal and were announced by the National Science Foundation on Wednesday.
The planet circles a star called Gliese 581. It's about 120 trillion miles away, so it would take several generations for a spaceship to get there. It may seem like a long distance, but in the scheme of the vast universe, this planet is "like right in our face, right next door to us," Vogt said in an interview.
That close proximity and the way it was found so early in astronomers' search for habitable planets hints to scientists that planets like Earth are probably not that rare.
Vogt and Butler ran some calculations, with giant fudge factors built in, and figured that as much as one out of five to 10 stars in the universe have planets that are Earth-sized and in the habitable zone.
With an estimated 200 billion stars in the universe, that means maybe 40 billion planets that have the potential for life, Vogt said. However, Ohio State University's Scott Gaudi cautioned that is too speculative about how common these planets are.
Vogt and Butler used ground-based telescopes to track the star's precise movements over 11 years and watch for wobbles that indicate planets are circling it. The newly discovered planet is actually the sixth found circling Gliese 581. Two looked promising for habitability for a while, another turned out to be too hot and the fifth is likely too cold. This sixth one bracketed right in the sweet spot in between, Vogt said.
With the star designated "a," its sixth planet is called Gliese 581g.
"It's not a very interesting name and it's a beautiful planet," Vogt said. Unofficially, he's named it after his wife: "I call it Zarmina's World."
The star Gliese 581 is a dwarf, about one-third the strength of our sun. Because of that, it can't be seen without a telescope from Earth, although it is in the Libra constellation, Vogt said.
But if you were standing on this new planet, you could easily see our sun, Butler said.
The low-energy dwarf star will live on for billions of years, much longer than our sun, he said. And that just increases the likelihood of life developing on the planet, the discoverers said.
"It's pretty hard to stop life once you give it the right conditions," Vogt said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100929/ap_on_sc/us_sci_new_earths
WASHINGTON – Astronomers say they have for the first time spotted a planet beyond our own in what is sometimes called the Goldilocks zone for life: Not too hot, not too cold. Juuuust right.
Not too far from its star, not too close. So it could contain liquid water. The planet itself is neither too big nor too small for the proper surface, gravity and atmosphere.
It's just right. Just like Earth.
"This really is the first Goldilocks planet," said co-discoverer R. Paul Butler of the Carnegie Institution of Washington.
The new planet sits smack in the middle of what astronomers refer to as the habitable zone, unlike any of the nearly 500 other planets astronomers have found outside our solar system. And it is in our galactic neighborhood, suggesting that plenty of Earth-like planets circle other stars.
Finding a planet that could potentially support life is a major step toward answering the timeless question: Are we alone?
Scientists have jumped the gun before on proclaiming that planets outside our solar system were habitable only to have them turn out to be not quite so conducive to life. But this one is so clearly in the right zone that five outside astronomers told The Associated Press it seems to be the real thing.
"This is the first one I'm truly excited about," said Penn State University's Jim Kasting. He said this planet is a "pretty prime candidate" for harboring life.
Life on other planets doesn't mean E.T. Even a simple single-cell bacteria or the equivalent of shower mold would shake perceptions about the uniqueness of life on Earth.
But there are still many unanswered questions about this strange planet. It is about three times the mass of Earth, slightly larger in width and much closer to its star — 14 million miles away versus 93 million. It's so close to its version of the sun that it orbits every 37 days. And it doesn't rotate much, so one side is almost always bright, the other dark.
Temperatures can be as hot as 160 degrees or as frigid as 25 degrees below zero, but in between — in the land of constant sunrise — it would be "shirt-sleeve weather," said co-discoverer Steven Vogt of the University of California at Santa Cruz.
It's unknown whether water actually exists on the planet, and what kind of atmosphere it has. But because conditions are ideal for liquid water, and because there always seems to be life on Earth where there is water, Vogt believes "that chances for life on this planet are 100 percent."
The astronomers' findings are being published in Astrophysical Journal and were announced by the National Science Foundation on Wednesday.
The planet circles a star called Gliese 581. It's about 120 trillion miles away, so it would take several generations for a spaceship to get there. It may seem like a long distance, but in the scheme of the vast universe, this planet is "like right in our face, right next door to us," Vogt said in an interview.
That close proximity and the way it was found so early in astronomers' search for habitable planets hints to scientists that planets like Earth are probably not that rare.
Vogt and Butler ran some calculations, with giant fudge factors built in, and figured that as much as one out of five to 10 stars in the universe have planets that are Earth-sized and in the habitable zone.
With an estimated 200 billion stars in the universe, that means maybe 40 billion planets that have the potential for life, Vogt said. However, Ohio State University's Scott Gaudi cautioned that is too speculative about how common these planets are.
Vogt and Butler used ground-based telescopes to track the star's precise movements over 11 years and watch for wobbles that indicate planets are circling it. The newly discovered planet is actually the sixth found circling Gliese 581. Two looked promising for habitability for a while, another turned out to be too hot and the fifth is likely too cold. This sixth one bracketed right in the sweet spot in between, Vogt said.
With the star designated "a," its sixth planet is called Gliese 581g.
"It's not a very interesting name and it's a beautiful planet," Vogt said. Unofficially, he's named it after his wife: "I call it Zarmina's World."
The star Gliese 581 is a dwarf, about one-third the strength of our sun. Because of that, it can't be seen without a telescope from Earth, although it is in the Libra constellation, Vogt said.
But if you were standing on this new planet, you could easily see our sun, Butler said.
The low-energy dwarf star will live on for billions of years, much longer than our sun, he said. And that just increases the likelihood of life developing on the planet, the discoverers said.
"It's pretty hard to stop life once you give it the right conditions," Vogt said.
Comments
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i think we should observe it first.
What if we send a crew there and there are ? dinosaurs or some ? ? that would be ?
also, i dont think were gunna get there anytime soon. We cant even space travel at the speed of light yet. were a pitiful race.
Yea, now that we know it's there I think we will speed up trying to create a vehicle that can travel in space or at the least a rocket that will make it to the planet to land on and observe it and send images/video back to Earth.
Outside of that none of our telescopes are strong enough to even remotely tell if their is life on it. -
We need to go up and observe it on some Lost Planet/ Mass Effect type ish before we start colonizing
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Will never happen before we destroy ourselves first.
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Its a one way trip... travel there will not occur in our lifetime unless some mega discovery/invention is made.
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major pain wrote: »Its a one way trip... travel there will not occur in our lifetime unless some mega discovery/invention is made.
Yea, It would take another 100 years at the very least.
I remember watching a show called sci-fi science and Michio Kaku was talking about ways we could space travel. He kept mentioning this thing called the Bussard Ramjet, there are alot of scientist who say it will work but they can't find anyone willing to fund it's design which would be close to a trillion dollars. It would take us 70 years using it to reach the goldilocks zone, from there I dont know how far the planet is. They would have to make that ? big enough to be space station if people were going to travel with it though. -
DAMN! Why does everything in the universe have to be so damn far!
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Ioniz3dSPIRITZ wrote: »DAMN! Why does everything in the universe have to be so damn far!
So that ? like us don't go around ? ? up. Have you seen what we've done to our own planet? lol -
Great, now white people will want to conquer and destroy that planet too."It's not a very interesting name and it's a beautiful planet," Vogt said. Unofficially, he's named it after his wife: "I call it Zarmina's World."
Coincidence that you can spell the word WARLODISM using the letters of the name of this planet? -
So that ? like us don't go around ? ? up. Have you seen what we've done to our own planet? lol
but not all of us are like that.
I think we life forms were spread out for a reason. Maybe we were never meant to explore outside of our solar system. Something that far is almost pointless no matter how facsinating space is.
Were developing all this technology and wont even be alive to see it in use. -
thats some fascinating ? ....
i gotta hear dr. michu kakiu (sp?) opinion on this tho -
? like this make me wanna get frozen on some Futurama steez so i can wake up in the future and travel to different planets, meet aliens, and stuff
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When I die I revert back into spirit and travel within a beam of light to this planet and manifest life through a lungfish like creature. I will repeat the process of evolution and after millions of years once again have the perfect vehicle to roam this new planet.
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its over: 2012! wrote: »"suggesting that plenty of Earth-like planets circle other stars."
is *suggesting* used, in this instance, as a fancy way of saying we really don't know a muthufuccn thing...and we're just speculating like our ancestors did?...lol...? is good, ? is great, and likely LOL'ing at fool's debate
No read again ? .
This is one they found, they are suggesting there are others out there as well.
You know how before they "suggested" the goldilocks zone may have Earth like planets, Christians got their panties in a bunch talking about ? wouldn't built one, well now they found one, deal with it.
? is good, ? is great, ? made a new planet so normal people could go live elsewhere. I hope they fix this planet after I die so that the future generations can go explore space. -
its over: 2012! wrote: »oh I read it again, you BIGGER ? , and I still smell nothing but speculation. You know, same thing our ancestors came up with.
"...So it 'could' contain liquid water..."
well according to this story, they aren't too sure yet about the capabilities of sustaining life in a Earth-like way.
Now, either I missed much much more...or else...you're just much much more dumber, than you originally gauged.
Are you really so naive to believe that only 1 of the billions of planets in the universe "could" sustain life? So we won the intergalactic lottery? -
Ioniz3dSPIRITZ wrote: »but not all of us are like that.
I think we life forms were spread out for a reason. Maybe we were never meant to explore outside of our solar system. Something that far is almost pointless no matter how facsinating space is.
Were developing all this technology and wont even be alive to see it in use.
Right, not all of us are like that, but the ones close enough to obtaining that type of technology are. The people in power today are straight up evil. -
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WEll they are gonna need cheap labor there, hell maybe even free labor (hint, hint). They are rushing to outter space & haven't even explored the depths of the oceans. That's why ? 's don't care about the earth anymore tho, since it has been pillaged, and is deemed useless, only thing left to do here is manipulate the ppl.
