Might this be "Plan-et B, C,and D"?
NASA announces finding 3 earth-like planets in habitable zone around a red dwarf Sun(Trappist 1) just 40 light years away.
ttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2017/02/22/nasa-announcement-live/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2017/02/22/nasa-announcement-live/#update-20170222-1936
*******************
A Single Star Is Home to At Least 7 Earthlike Planets (3 of wch are potentially life-supporting)
https://www.yahoo.com/news/nasa-announces-single-star-home-194245041.html
NASA Announces potentially life-supporting earth-like exoplanets orbit nearby star
Feb 22, 2017
The largest known system of Earth-like exoplanets has been found orbiting a dwarf star in the Milky Way. At least three of the seven rocky exoplanets could have oceans of water, making it possible that the system could harbour life. The discovery lends weight to the growing belief among some astronomers that our galaxy could be teeming with Earth-like worlds.The first exoplanet – a planet orbiting a star other than the Sun –was discovered 25 years ago, and since then, astronomers have identified thousands of such objects. Most are Jupiter-like gas giants because huge exoplanets are much easier to detect than smaller Earth-like worlds. However, improved techniques and new telescopes have led to the discovery of Earth-like exoplanets with the potential to harbour life.In 2010, an international team of astronomers began using the TRAPPIST telescope in Chile to search for Earth-like exoplanets orbiting small stars nearby in the Milky Way. They were looking for tiny drops in the intensity of a star that occur when an exoplanet's orbit takes it between the star and Earth. Such "transits" of small exoplanets are much easier to see with dwarf stars because the change in intensity is large.
Rocky compositions
Just 40 light-years from Earth, they spotted a star they called TRAPPIST-1 that appeared to be transited by several exoplanets. Now, further observations –including 20 days of continuous monitoring using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope – have revealed seven exoplanets in the TRAPPIST-1 system. The exoplanets have orbital periods ranging from 1.5–20 days. All seven objects appear to be similar in size to Earth, with radii ranging from 0.77–1.13 Earth radii. The team was able to determine the mass and density of six of the exoplanets, which suggests that they have rocky compositions.TRAPPIST-1 is about 80 times more massive than Jupiter. So instead of resembling the Sun and its planets, the system is similar to Jupiter and its four Galilean moons – according to team member Michaël Gillon of the University of Liege in Belgium. Gillon says that three of the planets orbit within the habitable zone of the star, which means that they could have liquid water and even life.TRAPPIST-1's nearness to Earth combined with the fact that the exoplanets are relatively large compared with the star means that it should be possible to study the exoplanet atmospheres. This would provide important information about chemical composition and the possibility of life.
Climate studies
According to Amaury Triaud of the University of Cambridge in the UK, the team is now trying to work out if the exoplanets are shrouded in envelopes of hydrogen – which would suggest that they are not Earth-like. The James Webb Space Telescope – to be launched in 2018 – will have the capability to study the composition of the exoplanet's atmospheres and even their climates. "We could know if there is life in TRAPPIST-1 within a decade," says Triaud.TRAPPIST-1 is described in Nature. Hear Sara Seager explain how astronomers are searching for life on exoplanets in this podcast: Searching for life on other planets.
About the author
Hamish Johnston is editor of physicsworld.com
earth-like planets probably abundant in our galaxy
ReplyDeleteBest bet yet: may have liquid surface water!
It would take us 800,000 years to get to the TRAPPIST-1star system using our current propulsion systems which max out at a robust, but not interstellar-ready 29,000 mph. But if we could travel at just half the speed of light,we could be there in just 80 years.
This couldd be our first rest stop in our exploration of our galaxy.
But first we have to preserve our life support system on earth long enough to greatly improve our transport technology and enable interstellar travel.(not only does Trump refuse to address "climate change", he wants to increase US arsenal of nuclear weapons!)
Slew of New Exoplanets Found:NASA has provided an update on the Kepler Space Telescope's search for exoplanets and the total number of new worlds discovered is staggering. The space agency announced that, since their last briefing on the landmark device, Kepler has found an astounding 219 potential new planets, including a tantalizing ten which are thought to be around the size of the Earth and also reside in an orbit, known as the Goldilocks zone, that is believed to be the ideal spot for water, and thus life, to exist.
Deletehttp://www.coasttocoastam.com/article/slew-of-new-exoplanets-found/
Age of the exoplanetary system will be critical determinant of how advanced any life forms have evolved! The older yhe system, the more time for evolution of life and presumably the higher yhe organizational complexity that life will have attained.
ReplyDeletenot so far! ...just a hop, skip, and a jump.
ReplyDeletethe even greater challenge will be to traverse the far greater tracts of empty space between galaxies!
But as you say, the more immediate challenge for humanity will be to survive. ..long enough to acquire these capabilities!
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2128443-quickest-we-could-visit-another-star-is-69-years-heres-how/
ReplyDeleteQuickest we could visit another star is 69 years – here’s how
The bright lights could just draw you inNASA, ESA, H. Bond (STScI), and M. Barstow (University of Leicester)By Abigail Beall
Of all the stars in the sky, you might assume the closest to the sun would be the easiest to visit. But this may not be the case.René Heller at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Göttingen, Germany, says we could reach and orbit Sirius, the brightest star in our night sky, in just 69 years. This is despite the fact that it is twice as far away as our nearest stars in the Alpha Centauri system, which would take at least 90 years to reach.
A private enterprise called Breakthrough Starshot is hoping to send a fleet of small, wafer-thin spacecraft to visit Alpha Centauri and explore its tantalising planets. Previous estimates by Breakthrough Starshot have indicated they could reach Alpha Centauri in just 20 years, travelling at a fifth of the speed of light. But this estimate was calculated for a flyby mission, passing by in just a few seconds.
That’s not much use if you actually want to observe anything when you’re there: the spacecraft would need to slow down. Earlier this year, Heller and independent researcher Michael Hippke showed how light from the stars themselves could be used to slow down a solar-sail powered spacecraft.
That technique might put Alpha Centauri at a disadvantage. Such a mission to put the spacecraft in orbit there around the star Proxima Centauri, for example, would take around 140 years, Heller has calculated.Sirius is 8 light years away, twice as far as Alpha Centauri, but 16 times as bright, so its light would help the spacecraft both speed up and then decelerate.
Simple math
The results surprised Heller at first, but the math is simple, he says.The time it takes to travel to the star system and then stay there is a function of the distance divided by the square root of the luminosity, so it would take less time to travel to Sirius compared to Alpha Centauri.The idea is “innovative and interesting”, says Avi Loeb at Harvard University. “However, the concept requires an extremely thin sail if the goal is to reach a fraction of the speed of light.”
Heller and Hippke say the key to cracking this issue lies in material science.“We need a very light, solid, temperature-resistant, and highly reflective sail material that can span an area of several hundred metres squared,” says Heller.The material could possibly be based on graphene with a metamaterial coating, he says. “If this works out, then humanity can really go interstellar.”
Journal reference:
https://arxiv.org/abs/1704.03871
Promising New Exoplanet FoundAstronomers have announced the discovery of a tantalizing exoplanet that is relatively close to the Earth and appears to possess the ideal conditions to support life. The newfound world, which has been given the moniker 'Ross 128 b,' sits a mere 11 light-years away, making it the closest potentially hospitable exoplanet yet to be found. What makes Ross 128 b particularly intriguing to scientists is that it orbits a fairly dim star and, therefore, it is not subjected to harsh radiation that would render life impossible.
ReplyDeletethe shining stars beckon us to move onward and upward!
ReplyDeleteWill human life continue into the future?
ReplyDeleteWill humans one day develope the technology to travel between yhr stsrs and colonize other solar systems?
Only if we can learn to live together cooperatively and sustainably on spaceship earth.
It iz the test of enduring survivability.
Long live humankind!
Zager & Evans - In the Year 2525
Deletehttps://binged.it/2WpLgjg
the key to living on a spaceship is cooperation ---cooperating to achieve a common goal.
ReplyDeleteIf humans cannot live cooperatively on spaceship earth they won;t get very far