Can We Spot Volcanoes on Alien Worlds? Astronomers Say Yes

SOURCE: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
September 07, 2010

Cambridge, MA - Volcanoes display the awesome power of Nature like few other events. Earlier this year, ash from an Icelandic volcano disrupted air travel throughout much of northern Europe. Yet this recent eruption pales next to the fury of Jupiter's moon Io, the most volcanic body in our solar system.

Now that astronomers are finding rocky worlds orbiting distant stars, they're asking the next logical questions: Do any of those worlds have volcanoes? And if so, could we detect them? Work by theorists at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics suggests that the answer to the latter is a qualified "Yes."

"You would need something truly earthshaking, an eruption that dumped a lot of gases into the atmosphere," said Smithsonian astronomer Lisa Kaltenegger. "Using the James Webb Space Telescope, we could spot an eruption 10 to 100 times the size of Pinatubo for the closest stars," she added.

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706 Earthlike Planets Discovered By NASA Spacecraft‏

SOURCE: Space.com
18 June 2010

NASA's Kepler spacecraft hunting for Earth-like planets around other stars has found 706 candidates for potential alien worlds while gazing at more than 156,000 stars packed into a single patch of the sky.

If all 706 of these objects pass the stringent follow-up tests to determine if they are actually planets, and not false alarms, they could nearly triple the current number of known extrasolar planets. They were announced as part of a huge release of data from the mission's first 43 days by NASA's Kepler science team this week.

The Kepler space observatory monitors stars for subtle changes in their brightness, which could indicate the presence of alien planets passing in front of them as seen from Earth. Astronomers will use the newly-released data from Kepler to determine if orbiting planets are responsible for the variation in brightness of several hundred stars.

Read the full story here:

For more information:

Millions of Earths? Talk causes a stir See Video!
A World of Difference between 'Earth-Like' and 'Earth-Sized'
140 Earth-like planets discovered in the Milky Way by Kepler See Video!
Dimitar Sasselov: How we found hundreds of Earth-like planets See Video!

NASA's Kepler Space Telescope Discovers Five Exoplanets

SOURCE: NASA
January 04, 2010

PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA's Kepler space telescope, designed to find Earth-size planets in the habitable zone of sun-like stars, has discovered its first five new exoplanets, or planets beyond our solar system.

Kepler's high sensitivity to both small and large planets enabled the discovery of the exoplanets, named Kepler 4b, 5b, 6b, 7b and 8b. The discoveries were announced Monday, Jan. 4, by members of the Kepler science team during a news briefing at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Washington.

"These observations contribute to our understanding of how planetary systems form and evolve from the gas and dust disks that give rise to both the stars and their planets," said William Borucki of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. Borucki is the mission's science principal investigator. "The discoveries also show that our science instrument is working well. Indications are that Kepler will meet all its science goals."

Read the full story here:

For more information:

The First Five Worlds of Kepler See Video!
Searching for Alien Earths: The Kepler Space Telescope

Earth-like planets could be found soon: astronomers

SOURCE: CBC News
January 8, 2010

Astronomers say they are on the verge of finding planets like Earth orbiting other stars, a key step in determining if we are alone in the universe.

A top NASA official and other leading scientists say that within four or five years they should discover the first Earth-like planet where life could develop, or may have already. A planet close to the size of Earth could even be found sometime this year if preliminary hints from a new space telescope pan out.

At the annual American Astronomical Society conference this week, each discovery involving so-called "exoplanets" — those outside our solar system — pointed to the same conclusion: Quiet planets like Earth where life could develop probably are plentiful, despite a violent universe of exploding stars, crushing black holes and colliding galaxies.

NASA's new Kepler telescope and a wealth of new research from the suddenly hot and competitive exoplanet field generated noticeable buzz at the convention. Scientists are talking about being at "an incredible special place in history" and closer to answering a question that has dogged humanity since the beginning of civilization.

"The fundamental question is: Are we alone? For the first time, there's an optimism that sometime in our lifetimes we're going to get to the bottom of that," said Simon (Pete) Worden, an astronomer who heads NASA's Ames Research Center. "If I were a betting man, which I am, I would bet we're not alone — there is a lot of life."

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And
Astronomers: We could find Earth-like planets soon

Our Milky Way Galaxy

This is our home galaxy called "Milky Way" This arrow shows us where our sun is in the galaxy.

See Video!

The Milky Way is a galaxy that contains at least 200 billion stars and their planetary systems. It is an average-size galaxy of the barred spiral class. This means that there is a central bulge, with arms, which extend for several light-years*. However, the term "barred" means that its central bulge is elongated; in the Milky Way, this elongation is at a ratio of 2:3, meaning that it is about one and a half times as long as it is wide.
The Milky Way has five distinct arms protruding from the central bulge. Their names are as follows: the Cygnus Arm, Centarus Arm, Sagittarius Arm, Orion Arm, and Perseus Arm. Our solar system lies in the Orion Arm.
The Milky Way belongs to a group of galaxies that is known as the Local Group. The Local Group contains about 30 galaxies, two of which are the Andromeda Galaxy and the Triangulum Galaxy. The Local Group is 9 million light-years in diameter.
In turn, the Local Group belongs to a much larger group of galaxies which known as the Virgo Supercluster. The Milky Way lies on the outer edge of the supercluster. The Virgo Supercluster is about 100 million light-years in diameter.
The Milky Way is 100 thousand light-years in diameter. The Milky Way takes approximately 225 million years to rotate, clockwise, even though the arm that we are in is whipping around the center at about 465,000 miles an hour. At that speed, a space ship from Earth would only need a half an hour to get to the moon!

This image is of the night sky the Milky Way Galaxy.

 

When we look up at the night sky we can see part of the Milky Way galaxy stretching across the night sky even though we are part of the Milky Way. That is because we are located at one small part of the Milky Way Galaxy and from our position we can see the dense cloud of stars formin another piece of the Milky Way.

  Properties of the Milky Way

Diameter of the Galaxy 100,000 light years

Classification of the Galaxy SBbc

Number of stars in the Galaxy 200 billion

Mass of the Galaxy 1 trillion solar masses

Length of the central bar 25,000 light years

Distance of the Sun from the centre 26,000 light years

Thickness of the Galaxy at the Sun 2,000 light years

Velocity of Sun around the Galaxy 220 km/s

Orbital period of Sun around the Galaxy 225 million years

Below - four galaxies which look like the Milky Way. NGC 3953 (top left) is 55 million light years away and 95,000 light years in diameter. NGC 5970 (top right) is 105 million light years away and 85,000 light years in diameter. NGC 7329 (bottom left) is even further at a distance of 140 million light years but it is larger with a diameter of 140,000 light years. NGC 7723 (bottom right) is 80 million light years away with a diameter of 90,000 light years.

***********

 How many galaxies are in the Universe?
The known universe consists of about 200 to 300 billion galaxies.

Galaxy has 'billions of Earths'

Visit this great site "We Are Not Alone" for more information about stars and galaxies.

How the Milky Way Works, click here, here & here.
The Stars of the Milky Way
Galactic Habitable Zone

What is a light year?
*One light year is about 5,878,499,000,000 miles.

New Tourist's Guide to the Milky Way
The picture of our galaxy is constantly changing as technology improves. --Space.com

Travel 10 million light years.....In 1 minutes. (Video)
Travel through your universe from outside the milky way down into the atoms which make up your world.

'Waterworld' Is Most Earth-Like Planet Yet

SOURCE: Sky News
December 16, 2009

Astronomers have discovered a new "waterworld" 40 light years away, raising the chances of the existence of Earth-like planets.

Evidence suggests it has an atmosphere, and astronomers believe it to be more like Earth than any planet found outside the Solar System so far.

Although the planet is thought to be too hot to sustain Earth-type life, it is believed to consist of 75% water.

Planet GJ1214b is six times bigger than Earth and was discovered orbiting a small faint star 1.3 million miles away.

Although its red dwarf parent star is 3,000 times less bright than the Sun, it hugs the star so closely that its surface temperature is an oven-hot 200C.

"Since this planet is so close to Earth, Hubble should be able to detect the atmosphere and determine what it's made of."

Dr David Charbonneau, from the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre

Graduate student astronomer Zachory Berta, from the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics in the US, who spotted the first hints of the planet, said: "Despite its hot temperature, this appears to be a waterworld.

"It is much smaller, cooler and more Earth-like than any other known exoplanet."

He said some of the planet's water should be in the form of exotic materials such as Ice Seven - a crystalline form of water that exists at pressures greater than 20,000 times the Earth's sea-level atmosphere.

Scientists want to turn the Hubble Space Telescope towards the planet to allow astronomers to discover its composition.

Dr David Charbonneau, also from the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre, said: "Since this planet is so close to Earth, Hubble should be able to detect the atmosphere and determine what it's made of.

"That will make it the first super-Earth with a confirmed atmosphere - even though that atmosphere probably won't be hospitable to life as we know it."

The discovery is reported in the journal Nature.

This article: here.

Super-Earth: Astronomers Find a Watery New Planet

Avatar's moon Pandora could be real

SOURCE: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
December 17, 2009

Cambridge, MA - In the new blockbuster Avatar, humans visit the habitable - and inhabited - alien moon called Pandora. Life-bearing moons like Pandora or the Star Wars forest moon of Endor are a staple of science fiction. With NASA's Kepler mission showing the potential to detect Earth-sized objects, habitable moons may soon become science fact. If we find them nearby, a new paper by Smithsonian astronomer Lisa Kaltenegger shows that the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will be able to study their atmospheres and detect key gases like carbon dioxide, oxygen, and water vapor.

"If Pandora existed, we potentially could detect it and study its atmosphere in the next decade," said Lisa Kaltenegger of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA).

So far, planet searches have spotted hundreds of Jupiter-sized objects in a range of orbits. Gas giants, while easier to detect, could not serve as homes for life as we know it. However, scientists have speculated whether a rocky moon orbiting a gas giant could be life-friendly, if that planet orbited within the star's habitable zone (the region warm enough for liquid water to exist).

"All of the gas giant planets in our solar system have rocky and icy moons," said Kaltenegger. "That raises the possibility that alien Jupiters will also have moons. Some of those may be Earth-sized and able to hold onto an atmosphere."

Kepler looks for planets that cross in front of their host stars, which creates a mini-eclipse and dims the star by a small but detectable amount. Such a transit lasts only hours and requires exact alignment of star and planet along our line of sight. Kepler will examine thousands of stars to find a few with transiting worlds.

Once they have found an alien Jupiter, astronomers can look for orbiting moons, or exomoons. A moon's gravity would tug on the planet and either speed or slow its transit, depending on whether the moon leads or trails the planet. The resulting transit duration variations would indicate the moon's existence.

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For more information:
 
Sci-Fi's Coolest Worlds
Avatar's 'Pandora' could be a reality
The Real Science of Avatar's Pandora
Pandora: A look at Polyphemis' Exomoon
Avatar's Pandora moon may actually exist
Avatar: A New World That NASA Is Ignoring
'Avatar': The Real-Life Science Behind the Fantasy
Newly Discovered Exoplanets Point the Way to Avatar's Pandora

Visit this great site: PANDORAPEDIA The Official Guide to Pandora.

The Alpha Centauri System and Traveling There

Articles on the Alpha Centauri system, the possibility of traveling there, and other interstellar related articles.

Alpha Centauri & here.
Destination Alpha Centauri
First Ark to Alpha Centauri
How to Get to Alpha Centauri

Traveling from Earth to the Alpha Centauri system
Voyage to Pandora: Humanity's First Interstellar Flight
The Science Behind James Cameron's Avatar Voyaging to the Stars
Cosmic Journeys: Voyage to Pandora: Interstellar Flight See Video!

To learn about Interstellar travel & here.
Spaceship Could Fly Faster Than Light
The Universe - "Science Fiction, Science Fact" See Video!
Mark Millis on the possibilities of interstellar travel See Video!

Stephen Hawking's Warning (2006)
Move to new planet, says Hawking
Humans must colonize other planets: Hawking
Stephen Hawking: Humans Must Leave Earth to Survive
Hawking Says Humans Must Colonize Other Planets to Survive

Stephen Hawking's Warning (2010) UPDATE
Stephen Hawking's Ecological Warning
Stephen Hawking's Warning: Abandon Earth—Or Face Extinction
Abandon Earth or Face Extinction, Stephen Hawking Warns -- Again

Space colonization Click here, here & here.
Space Colonization: Future or Fanatsy?
NASA preps '100-year spaceship' NEW!
Is NASA Covering Up the 100-Year Starship? NEW!
Ion engine could one day power 39-day trips to Mars
Do We Have the 'Right Stuff' to Put an Astronaut on Mars?

Space Historian Sees Cyborgs in Our Future
Future Space Explorers Could Be Humans 2.0
Humans Only Have 200-300 Years Left on Earth
Visit this great site: The Future of Human Evolution
 

An artist picture of a future astronaut`s 1st breath of air on an alien planet.

"The long-term survival of the human race is at risk as long as it is confined to a single planet. Sooner or later, disasters such as an asteroid collision or nuclear war could wipe us all out. But once we spread out into space and establish independent colonies, our future should be safe. There isn't anywhere like the Earth in the solar system, so we would have to go to another star."
-- Stephen Hawking, Physicist

"By 2025 we expect new spacecraft designed for long journeys to allow us to begin the first ever crewed missions beyond the Moon into deep space. So we’ll start by sending astronauts to an asteroid for the first time in history. By the mid-2030s I believe we can send humans to orbit Mars and return them safely to Earth. And a landing on Mars will follow and I expect to be around in see it."
--President Barack Obama, Cape Canaveral, Florida. Speech outlining his administration's space policy, 15 April 2010.

"We'll build new ships to carry man forward into the universe, to gain a new foothold on the Moon and to prepare for new journeys to the worlds beyond our own. . . . We do not know where this journey will end, yet we know this: human beings are headed into the cosmos."
-- President George W. Bush, speech at NASA headquarters, 14 January 2004

"All civilizations become either spacefaring or extinct."
-- Carl Sagan, Astronomer

First Super-Earths Discovered Orbiting Sun-Like Stars

SOURCE: Science Daily
Dec. 14, 2009

An international team of planet hunters has discovered as many as six low-mass planets around two nearby Sun-like stars, including two "super-Earths" with masses 5 and 7.5 times the mass of Earth. The researchers, led by Steven Vogt of the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Paul Butler of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, said the two "super-Earths" are the first ones found around Sun-like stars.

"These detections indicate that low-mass planets are quite common around nearby stars. The discovery of potentially habitable nearby worlds may be just a few years away," said Vogt, a professor of astronomy and astrophysics at UCSC.

The team found the new planet systems by combining data gathered at the W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii and the Anglo-Australian Telescope (AAT) in New South Wales, Australia. Two papers describing the new planets have been accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal.

Three of the new planets orbit the bright star 61 Virginis, which can be seen with the naked eye under dark skies in the Spring constellation Virgo. Astronomers and astrobiologists have long been fascinated with this particular star, which is only 28 light-years away. Among hundreds of our nearest stellar neighbors, 61 Vir stands out as being the most nearly similar to the Sun in terms of age, mass, and other essential properties. Vogt and his collaborators have found that 61 Vir hosts at least three planets, with masses ranging from about 5 to 25 times the mass of Earth.

Recently, a separate team of astronomers used NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope to discover that 61 Vir also contains a thick ring of dust at a distance roughly twice as far from 61 Vir as Pluto is from our Sun. The dust is apparently created by collisions of comet-like bodies in the cold outer reaches of the system.

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For more information:

Super-Earths Orbit Neighboring Stars
Super-Earths found orbiting nearby stars
Super-Earths Found Around Sun-Like Stars

Astronomers find 'super Earth' around another star; call it Rocky

SOURCE: The Christian Science Monitor
September 16, 2009

Quick! Before you begin reading, drop down to the bottom of the post, activate the YouTube link, then quickly scroll back up here (all you really need is the sound).

Laydeeezzz and gentlemun, boyzzz and girlzzz, an international team of astronomers on the Third Rock from the sun gives you the best evidence yet for a rocky planet -- not too much bigger than Earth -- orbiting another star.

The planet is called CoRoT-7b. And it appears to have a sibling super-Earth, CoRoT-7c, though much less is known about it. This makes the system the first dual super-Earth system astronomers have found. The team summarized its findings today at the European Planetary Science Congress, meeting this week in Postdam, Germany.

You can find a lay-language summary here. You can find a PDF of the formal results, accepted for publication in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, here.

CoRoT-7b is the smallest exoplanet found so far. It's slightly more than 1.5 times as large as Earth. But any vague resemblance stops there.

The parent star -- 500 light-years away in the constellation Monoceros -- is some 1.5 billion years old. The planet orbits its star at a distance of less then 2 million miles, giving it a "year" that lasts about 20 hours.

With an orbit that close, the team estimates that the temperatures on the planet's surface range somewhere between 1,527 to 2,327 degrees Celsius on the sunlit portion (think molten on the surface) and a frosty -200 degrees C on the night portion.

Read More:

First rocky planet found outside solar system