backtop

Print 66 comment(s) - last by FaceMaster.. on Dec 7 at 12:58 PM

Kepler-22b  (Source: wired.com)
Kepler-22b was found 600 light-years away in the habitable zone

NASA’s Kepler space telescope has discovered one of the most Earth-like planets yet in the middle of the habitable zone, meaning that it may be suitable for life.
 
NASA’s Kepler space telescope, which was named after 17th-century German astronomer Johannes Kepler, aims to discover Earth-like planets orbiting other stars. It launched March 7, 2009 and has a minimum expected mission lifetime of 3.5 years. So far, the Kepler space telescope has found 2,326 potential Earth-like planets.
 
Now, the telescope has made a new discovery that has NASA astronomers buzzing. The new planet is called Kepler-22b, and it is 600 light-years away from Earth. It was found in the middle of the habitable zone, which is the region around a star where temperatures are neither too hot nor too cold for liquid water to dwell.
 
Kepler-22b orbits a star very similar to the sun, except it’s a bit smaller and cooler. It orbits this star every 290 days.
 
The planet itself is 2.4 times the size of Earth, but that’s about all that is known about Kepler-22b. Its mass/composition is unclear at this point, meaning it could be a “global ocean” or entirely rocky.
 
“If this planet has a surface, it would have a very nice temperature of some 70 degrees Fahrenheit (21 degrees Celsius),” said William Borucki of NASA’s Ames Research Center. “It’s another milestone on the journey of discovering Earth’s twin.”

According to Borucki, the Kepler space telescope had to wait for Kepler-22b to pass three times before it could consider it a confirmed planet instead of just a candidate. The first passing was caught only three days after the Kepler space telescope was functional. Now, at the First Kepler Science Conference at NASA Ames, it was announced that the third passing occurred over the 2010 holiday season and Kepler-22b is officially an Earth-like planet -- and one of the closest to being Earth's twin to date, according to BBC News.

Kepler-22b differs from most habitable planets in that it orbits a star much like the sun rather than a red dwarf sun, which can be rather dim, and it is in the middle of the habitable zone rather than on the edge with harsher temperatures.

Since February 2011 alone, the Kepler space telescope has found 1,094 new planets, where 48 total have turned out to be genuine planets. The SETI Institute, which searches for extraterrestrial life in the universe via the Allen Telescope Array in California, says the Kepler space telescope’s findings, including Kepler-22b, are helpful in the effort to discover other life beyond Earth.
 
“We’re taking everything we can get from our Kepler colleagues to look for techno-signatures,” said Jill Tarter of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California.
 

Sources: BBC News, PC Mag


Comments     Threshold


This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled
600 light years?
By tayb on 12/5/2011 8:51:42 PM , Rating: 1
It's crazy to think about. NASA astronomers are not looking at an earth like planet as it is now but as it was 600 years ago. The light has only reached us now. The planet could have blown up or drifted into the sun 599 years ago and we won't find out until next year. Interesting, it is.

Either we'll defy the "laws" of physics and laugh that we ever considered them laws or we'll never truly know what the universe has to offer.




RE: 600 light years?
By Connoisseur on 12/5/2011 9:27:04 PM , Rating: 1
It's only 599 years ago assuming you could somehow instantaneously move from earth to that planet (i.e. much faster than that speed of light). Otherwise, for all intents and purposes what you see now in any real sense of the word is how the planet IS now. Relativity is a b**ch.


RE: 600 light years?
By Ringold on 12/5/2011 10:24:22 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Otherwise, for all intents and purposes what you see now in any real sense of the word is how the planet IS now. Relativity is a b**ch.


It is, for us, but in the grand scheme of things, it isn't. 600 years has passed since then, there.

Which is why I prefer to think of that time aspect of relativity as bullshit. With it possible that the Europeans are detecting FTL neutrinos, and physicists suspecting at Fermilab and elsewhere that its a holographic universe, I still suspect the whole facade of physics will end up being overturned and rewritten. Too many things are arbitrary, too many things that could cause the standard model big problems.


RE: 600 light years?
By Connoisseur on 12/6/2011 8:54:58 AM , Rating: 1
Well, until relativity gets completely overturned, it still holds true. Your statement about "600 years has passed" is assuming some sort of arbitrary "God" perspective, which doesn't exist as far as i can tell.

There is so far NO known piece of information, no force, no perspective that can tell an observer what happens to the planet 600 years from now (short of insta-traveling to that location). Therefore that information doesn't exist yet to us. If humanity ever invents FTL travel we will, in a real sense, be time traveling.


RE: 600 light years?
By sigmatau on 12/6/2011 11:20:24 AM , Rating: 3
UM, no. We are viewing that planet as it existed 600 years ago. It doesn't matter that we cannot confirm this by having someone stationed in its orbit or being able to teleport to it and back instantaneously. That all doesn't matter.

If a tree falls in the woods and the closest person is miles away, does it make a noise? No. Does it make a sound? You betcha! Just because man wasn't there to record the sound, doesn't mean it didn't exist.

We wouldn't be able to explain many things if relativity prevented us from calculating the unobservable.


RE: 600 light years?
By SPOOFE on 12/6/2011 11:12:31 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
I still suspect the whole facade of physics will end up being overturned and rewritten. Too many things are arbitrary

Too many things conform to the Standard Model to expect "physics to be rewritten". Whatever theory replaces relativity will still have to encompass all observations made about relativity.


RE: 600 light years?
By mcnabney on 12/6/2011 4:51:04 PM , Rating: 3
This is just nerds trying not to get their hopes up. Of course nothing is going to change in the 'now', but a new model that permits FTL movement of particles just feeds the imagination and allows all kinds of Sci-Fi ideas to crystalize a bit more.

Also, I have been DYING to say that Einstein was WRONG!


RE: 600 light years?
By FPP on 12/6/2011 6:53:20 PM , Rating: 2
Best of luck...


RE: 600 light years?
By Adonlude on 12/7/2011 12:44:57 PM , Rating: 2
You guys are overthinking this light and relativity thing. Light is just information that our bodies can detect and it moves at a given velocity. An identical analogy would be if I were being attacked and I wrote you a letter telling you about it and it took two days for it to get to you. Instant travel, slow travel, either way when you get to me it will be 2+ days later and I may have been killed. :-(


RE: 600 light years?
By FaceMaster on 12/7/2011 12:58:17 PM , Rating: 3
Heh, I assumed we were talking about 'For the Lose' travel until it suddenly clicked.


RE: 600 light years?
By Iketh on 12/6/2011 8:46:08 AM , Rating: 2
Nahh, if you could instantaneously move from Earth to Kepler, you would have traveled into the future 600 years (according to our understandings, yet if you turned around and instantaneously traveled back to Earth, you would arrive back at your starting point instead of traveling another 600 years into the future). "Now" is the same everywhere, but it definitely has its own perspectives thanks to our human senses.


RE: 600 light years?
By BSMonitor on 12/6/2011 8:53:50 AM , Rating: 2
Not if you step out of normal space/time via a wormhole. He is talking about instantly being plopped on the other planet. ie If we just happened to be there right now. Not travelling to it by some means faster than light.


RE: 600 light years?
By Iketh on 12/6/2011 11:44:16 AM , Rating: 2
What's the difference?


RE: 600 light years?
By sigmatau on 12/6/2011 7:11:41 PM , Rating: 2
Not even close. If you instantaneously traveled 600 light years, you broke our laws of physics so you can make up anything you want to about it.

Let's say you traveled the 600 light years at near the speed of light. You will arrive at Kepler at what seems a short period of time, while EVERYTHING else would have aged the 600+ years it took you to get there. According to our understanding of physics, this is the best we can do right now.

Until we know what happens when things travel faster than the speed of light, there is really nothing to discuss except what we already know.

Also, your example was poor. If you travel to Kepler instantaneously, superseding our understanding of physics, how can you say this equals time travel? And how not going another 600 light years instantaneously, even though it is back from where you came, does not cause the same effect?


RE: 600 light years?
By Iketh on 12/6/2011 9:24:31 PM , Rating: 2
Because as you approach Kepler, you're running into the newer light reflected off of Kepler quicker. So if you traveled at 2x the speed of light towards Kepler, Kepler would appear to orbit its star at twice the speed of what you observed when stationary and would appear twice as bright, until eventually you see Kepler 300 years into the future compared to the perspective you had on Earth. Behind you, Earth would rotate in REVERSE orbit at half speed, though you couldn't see this by looking in the direction of Earth because light can't catch your eyes. Instead, you would have to look toward Kepler to view Earth and its surrounding sky travelling backwards through time at half brightness, or 50% transparency. (It would appear as though you were flying toward Kepler AND Earth.) When you make the return trip, the opposite happens, and if you traveled fast enough to be almost instant from the get-go, the two observations nullify each other.

Now, I know this is not the whole story because supposedly traveling at or faster than light is not possible (because our equations stop working, especially when throwing gravity into the mix) and time supposedly slows down to us as we approach the speed of light.

I was just using our fun basic laws of physics in my example.


RE: 600 light years?
By Mitch101 on 12/5/2011 10:46:29 PM , Rating: 4
quote:
The planet could have blown up or drifted into the sun 599 years ago and we won't find out until next year.


Only if the last 600 years the battle station has been made fully ARMED and OPERATIONAL but even then I see no signs of a hidden rebel base.


RE: 600 light years?
By Amiga500 on 12/6/2011 2:17:27 AM , Rating: 2
Depends...

If they have a trench with an exhaust port...


RE: 600 light years?
By MrBlastman on 12/6/2011 10:02:13 AM , Rating: 2
My wife would argue that even I have a trench with an exhaust port... some sort of inhumane weapon it is.


RE: 600 light years?
By The Raven on 12/6/2011 11:44:59 AM , Rating: 5
Now we know why you go by MrBlastman


RE: 600 light years?
By The Raven on 12/6/2011 11:44:12 AM , Rating: 3
quote:
but even then I see no signs of a hidden rebel base.
No there doesn't have to be one. They could've used Kepler-22b as a test subject of the battle station's destructive capabilities. An intergalactic New Mexico if you will.

And Dantooine is too remote to make an effective demonstration. I mean we haven't found Dantooine yet. It remains undiscovered by Earthicans. But Kepler-22b...that thing has some eyeballs on it!

So now it is up to us to send James Spader or a T-800 back through time and space to kill Grand Moff Tarkin before it is too late.


RE: 600 light years?
By delphinus100 on 12/5/2011 11:53:24 PM , Rating: 3
And The Sun could have exploded 7.5 minutes ago, and we all have about 30 seconds to live...

Even if there is a way to go faster, the speed of light is what it is, and some things can reasonably be assumed to still be out there, pretty much as we can observe them. (at least within a double-digit millions of light years...look deep enough, and there are some things must be significantly different by now)


RE: 600 light years?
By Shig on 12/6/11, Rating: 0
RE: 600 light years?
By jeff834 on 12/6/2011 4:03:39 AM , Rating: 3
There is an enormous difference between a telescope array on Earth and any sort of satellite telescope. We could build something 1000 times more powerful than Kepler, but if it stays on the planet it still won't be as good for finding planets using current techniques. If you want to look for subtle differences in luminosity of stars that are hundreds or thousands of light years away you need to be far away from the planet and pointing your telescope away from any light sources.

What amazes me is how good at finding planets we've become in such a short time. The first confirmed planet discovery was something like 15 years ago and since then each year of discovery blows the previous one away.

Whether this planet has water may be difficult to say. It's easy to point a spectrograph at Mars and say what's in the atmosphere since it is so close, and it's just as easy to tell the composition of stars 600 light years away because they are so large, but a planet 600 light years away is difficult. Knowing the size of the planet, and figuring out its mass from the amount of "wobble" it causes on its star makes inferring its density rather simple. Unfortunately density only really tells you rocky vs gassy and you need a little more than that to go on.


RE: 600 light years?
By sigmatau on 12/6/2011 7:28:11 PM , Rating: 2
Agreed, we went from finding 1-2 super gas giants a year, to several hundred much smaller planets a year. We also seem to have the resolution to observe their position in their solar system.


RE: 600 light years?
By sigmatau on 12/6/2011 7:24:34 PM , Rating: 2
You must now little about astronomy if you think a ground based telescope can outdo a space bound one. With a ground base telescope, you have to filter out so much light noise that has nothing to do with subject of your observation.

Let's see, you can't use the telescope during the day because the Sun outshines anything by a long shot. At night, you have to worry about the Moon being to bright in the sky, any man made lights, any kind of pollution/smog, etc. This is also true for some other forms of radiation that may be used to make observations.

Not only that, but weather plays a role on terrestrial telescopes. Clouds, rain, snow, morning dew, etc.

In space, none of these interfere with your observation. You don't have to reduce your source's light by using various filters to block out terrestrial lights. You don't have to worry about the weather. Actually, the weather is perfect in space and never changes. Now, you may have to worry about sun spots that may damage the telescope's electronics (as any satellite).

And of course it is cheaper to make a terrestrial telescope. Some don't even use glass lenses or mirrors but cement.

Nothing will ever beat the potential of space-based telescopes.


RE: 600 light years?
By Flunk on 12/6/2011 9:02:46 AM , Rating: 1
That's extremely unlikely, planets exist on a geological time scale and stars on an astrological time scale. When we talk about hundreds of millions and billions of years 600 years equivalent to less than a second to a human.


Kudos...
By MrBlastman on 12/5/2011 8:40:20 PM , Rating: 5
At least on DT it is being reported and titled simply as a potentially Earth-like planet, instead of elsewhere (like televised news) where they are saying the planet has water.

Think about it--it's 600 light years away. That's kinda far to know for sure whether it has water on it... :P




RE: Kudos...
By maven81 on 12/5/2011 9:19:06 PM , Rating: 3
Not really. With a sensitive spectrograph it should be possible to tell. We routinely obtain spectra from objects much farther away.


RE: Kudos...
By Hoeser on 12/5/2011 9:41:46 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah, but the objects we routinely obtain spectra from at that distance are also a whole hell of a lot bigger.


RE: Kudos...
By Ringold on 12/5/2011 10:11:43 PM , Rating: 2
Gas giants, in some instances, have had their spectra captured. I didnt read the above article, but one at Pop Sci I believe, and my understanding is that they're going to attempt to get that data next summer from Keck.

Admittedly, sounds extremely difficult, though.


RE: Kudos...
By MrBlastman on 12/6/2011 1:09:18 PM , Rating: 2
That is assuming we can get an image of the planet to begin with. Many times planets are discovered not by seeing them physically via a telescope, but by calculating oscillating differentials of the host star. In other words, the planets orbiting the star cause it to "wobble."

While our Universe is huge (see "Pale Blue Dot", 600 light years is still very far away. In the photo below, our Earth is only 3.7 billion miles away

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Pale_Blue_Dot.pn...

A light-year is 6... trillion miles. That means 600 light years is 3600 trillion miles away. That means that this planet is 972972973 times as far away (973 million) as the Earth in that photo. Couple this with the fact that the total output from its host star is far more luminous than the planet itself... and you have a very difficult challenge to actually image the planet itself.

This is precisely why they use the "wobbles" to detect extrasolar planets.

I'm not saying it can't be done, but what I am saying is the challenge is enormous and in no way 100% accurate. That is, unless you can open a door into a higher dimension, step through it and then downscale back into our dimension right next to the planet.

Fomalhaut, a star who's planets we have imaged, is only 25 light years away. Most of the extrasolar planets discovered so far are only 300 light years away from us. 2MASS_J044144 is a star 450 light years away and we think we have imaged a planet 5-10 times the mass of Jupiter around it... but we aren't sure. If you look up the photo... you'll see it isn't detailed at all:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2MJO$$x-wide-community.jpg

The planet in this article is only a couple times larger than Earth... Jupiter is 11 times wider in diameter than Earth and 317 times more massive. While not impossible--it is highly improbable we'll know for sure via a spectrograph. We might obtain spectra from objects farther away--these "objects" aren't exactly planets. The farthest ever imaged extrasolar planet is in 1RXS J160929.1-210524 and it is 470 light years away... and the planet is 330 AU's from the star and 8 times the mass of Jupiter. The planet in this article is less than 1 AU from the star or so they think. The odds are stacked against us here... for now.


RE: Kudos...
By maven81 on 12/6/2011 2:10:52 PM , Rating: 2
I'm not saying it's going to be easy, but you implied that it was impossible to know at that distance. It's difficult but not impossible.
You don't need to get a direct image either, one method is to subtract the spectra of the star from the spectra of the star+planet together. Granted whether even the Keck could do it I'm not sure, but better equipment is coming online all the time. 5 years ago we didn't have the instrumentation to even find this planet.

As far as pale blue dot goes, you have to remember that this was an image taken by Voyager who's camera was built in 1976 and consisted of a vidicon tube attached to a 7" (if memory serves) telescope. That's a far cry from huge modern observatories with their CCD detectors. The Webb telescope (if it ever gets launched) would probably be up to the task.


RE: Kudos...
By MrBlastman on 12/6/2011 2:19:27 PM , Rating: 2
I didn't say it was impossible. ;) You're putting words into my mouth. I said:

quote:
While not impossible--it is highly improbable we'll know for sure via a spectrograph.


And finished the whole post with "... for now."

Pale Blue Dot was only an example to put things in perspective. But yeah, it was 1976 equipment, we've come a long way since then.


RE: Kudos...
By JediJeb on 12/6/2011 2:20:59 PM , Rating: 2
Was this planet detected by the "wobble" method or the "eclipsing/transit" method which looks for shifts in luminosity instead of shift in spectrum?

The way to look for water is to try to get a spectrum of the starlight passing through the atmosphere of the star if possible. At this distance that would not be a simple task but maybe not impossible. You look for the absorbance spectrum of water which would mean that near the edge of the planetary disk in the image you would see a reduction of the wavelength of light from the star the corresponds the the wavelength absorbed by water.

Too bad the James Webb Space Telescope is not up there yet, it might be able to handle such a task.


RE: Kudos...
By MrBlastman on 12/6/2011 2:37:59 PM , Rating: 2
Kepler discovers planets via the "eclipsing/transit" method--and I believe the rest, i.e. the mass/density etc. will be confirmed using the wobble method though I'm not sure. The transit method makes it easy to tell whether their is a planet there or not--can be faster but beyond that, we need further studies and calculations to tell more about the candidate.


RE: Kudos...
By rs2 on 12/5/2011 10:41:31 PM , Rating: 2
It's not far away at all. The universe spans some billions of light years. This new planet is practically in our backyard, astronomically speaking.


RE: Kudos...
By Farfignewton on 12/6/11, Rating: -1
RE: Kudos...
By DrSpaceman on 12/6/2011 2:51:51 AM , Rating: 2
In astronomical terms, 600 light years is really close!


RE: Kudos...
By TSS on 12/6/2011 3:33:21 AM , Rating: 2
Well it's only about 140 days of travel at warp 9. It'll still take us 3 more centuries to develop that technology.

For now it's still very far away :p


RE: Kudos...
By sviola on 12/6/2011 7:16:24 AM , Rating: 2
I saw on discovery channel that they are looking forward to hyperspace travel, which would allows us to almost instantaneously travel to any point in the universe.


RE: Kudos...
By pburghdoom on 12/6/2011 7:57:32 AM , Rating: 2
ROLF, Discovery Channel...


RE: Kudos...
By niaaa on 12/6/2011 9:14:39 AM , Rating: 2
I've seen on discovery channel that we all look forward to be able to change the brain of the people who difficulties using theirs.


RE: Kudos...
By DrSpaceman on 12/7/2011 12:38:39 PM , Rating: 2
interesting... I always thought warp drive was faster than that...


RE: Kudos...
By DrSpaceman on 12/7/2011 12:40:25 PM , Rating: 2
I did a rough calculation and if our galaxy (the milky way) was the size of New York, the distance of this planet from earth would be about a stroll across Central Park (the long way, from North to South)...


realization
By maynard327 on 12/5/2011 11:16:33 PM , Rating: 1
At some point, and I expect it to be relatively sooner than later, our advancements in telescopic and microscopic technology will bring us to a point where we are seeing the same things in one (microscope) that we are seeing in another (telescope). Everything will completely change in every conceivable way at that point. We will realize the depth and magnitude of the expression, 'as above, so below'.




RE: realization
By delphinus100 on 12/5/2011 11:56:33 PM , Rating: 2
Atoms don't act like solar systems, quantum particle pair formation definitely doesn't act like superclusters of galaxies...


RE: realization
By MZperX on 12/6/2011 12:45:29 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah, I was about 9 or 10 years old when that thought occurred to me. My Dad set me straight on the whole macro-cosmos vs. quantum mechanics distinction. It's a common fallacy though, as it would be rather simple to think of the universe as a repeating pattern through infinite scaling. Alas, it's much more complex than that.


RE: realization
By maynard327 on 12/7/2011 1:19:54 AM , Rating: 2
Yeah, I was 6 or 7 when this thought initially occurred to me. There is more thought and experience that goes into this theory/conclusion than just an oversimplification of something tremendously complex. I'm a fairly ordinary, unexceptional kinda guy in most regards, but I am a genius. I'm gifted in pattern recognition. For as long as I can remember, I've been seeing things in patterns. It's very difficult to articulate in words... Has anyone here ever had an out-of-body experience?


RE: realization
By geekman1024 on 12/7/2011 3:15:07 AM , Rating: 2
Yeah, I was 4 or 5 when... Oh whatever.


RE: realization
By maynard327 on 12/7/2011 1:27:14 AM , Rating: 2
yes, this is true. We haven't seen far enough 'upward' and 'downward' yet to see the overlap in the pattern.


RE: realization
By Helbore on 12/6/2011 2:25:51 PM , Rating: 2
You've watched Men in Black too many times.


Children and teens need to know
By Ladyinthedark on 12/6/2011 11:05:53 AM , Rating: 2
I am a teen and i think that kids and teens should know...pretty much no one my age watches the news. I asked my friends if they heard about the new planet and they said no. People should find a way to intrest kids and teens so they know whats going on in their world




RE: Children and teens need to know
By MZperX on 12/6/2011 12:50:00 PM , Rating: 2
Hm, okay... My kids know because I told them. My son went: "Cool!" and promptly returned to playing Wii Sports Resort.

I really don't think they need to be exposed to world news in general though. Lot's of sick stuff going on.


RE: Children and teens need to know
By JediJeb on 12/6/2011 2:35:37 PM , Rating: 2
What's really sad is today it seems that even science teachers in the public schools are more interested in pushing social issues than informing their classes about science and new scientific discoveries. Worse yet is when you do get a science teacher that is dedicated to advancing their students knowledge of science, they have administration telling them to not worry about it and instead push the social issues. When I was a kid science was taught in science class, social issues were taught in social studies class, math was taught in math class, English was taught in English class, ect, now it seems every class revolves around how to get along with other students and how you are number one,(and he is number one, and she is number one, all the students are number one, regardless).

School is about educating students, not making them feel good. Feeling good should come from their social life including home, family, friends and other social events, not just from classroom experience. At school kids need to be educated, and pushed to their limits of learning, within reason. Give them knowledge of all educational disciplines up through high school and let them then decide what path to take beyond graduation. But at least keep them informed in all aspects especially something as important as a discovery like this one.


RE: Children and teens need to know
By th3pwn3r on 12/6/2011 2:48:06 PM , Rating: 1
Haha, this definitely made me laugh because it's true, every kid is number one. What we really need to do is teach children how to become better students and teachers how to become better teaches. It took me forever and a day to realize the best way I learn, I never liked being taught by teachers because I always had a bad view on them due to their attitude, too many teachers of mine thought they were supreme beings of sorts or know-it-alls which annoyed me. I eventually realized many people have fields they're knowledgeable in but need to be more humble. Personally I learn best when I teach myself, it's kind of sad that the last grade I completed was 8th because I dropped out but most of my friends and/or acquaintances think I'm so smart. I think it's a matter of people just not trying hard enough. Alright, enough of this book, TL;DR!


RE: Children and teens need to know
By Siki on 12/6/2011 5:05:38 PM , Rating: 2
Thank you for that insight. You obviously didn't try hard enough.


Travel to Keppler22b
By Gina on 12/6/2011 8:10:43 AM , Rating: 2
No body has mentioned time as the 4th dimension and wormholes. I know it's quite fantastic now, but think what was fantastic 100 years ago, 1000 years ago... If this planet is habitable, well make it there before the inevitable demise of our star.




RE: Travel to Keppler22b
By Iketh on 12/6/2011 8:54:02 AM , Rating: 2
yea but what was fantastic 100 years ago still obeyed the laws of physics... we're still trying to work time into the equation...


RE: Travel to Keppler22b
By Digimonkey on 12/6/2011 9:01:11 AM , Rating: 2
I wasn't aware the demise of our sun was a major concern for us humans. Pretty certain we'll be long gone before that event.


wrong name
By undummy on 12/5/2011 10:48:01 PM , Rating: 2
Its K-Pax. Prot told me so.

Planet Earth is their penal colony.




RE: wrong name
By bjacobson on 12/5/2011 11:06:25 PM , Rating: 2
We don't have telescopes on K-Pax. It's dangerous for the travelers. Would you want to be shrunk to the size of an ant while riding the bus?


realization
By maynard327 on 12/5/2011 11:15:13 PM , Rating: 2
test




RE: realization
By geekman1024 on 12/7/2011 3:16:49 AM , Rating: 2
Failed.


? What?
By tng on 12/6/2011 9:12:38 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
Since February 2011 alone, the Kepler space telescope has found 1,094 new planets, where 48 total have turned out to be genuine planets.
Maybe I missed something here, but is she saying that only 48 of the 1094 planets have been confirmed to be real and the rest they are still working on or what?




RE: ? What?
By kyp275 on 12/6/2011 2:25:38 PM , Rating: 2
The findings have to be confirmed by other larger ground based telescopes, which is booked pretty full, and are usually hard to get time for.


By Pablogavavla on 12/7/2011 12:25:01 PM , Rating: 2
I don't get why people (especially scientists) think that a planet needs to have temperatures and/or water levels like our planet to support "life".
The life that exists on this planet is here because it was able to evolve under the conditions that exist here.
There are an infinite number of variables that enabled our current condition to exist in the manner that it does. There doesn't seem to me to be any reason to believe that a completely different different set of conditions wouldn't lead to a completely different kind of "life" to evolve (or otherwise come into existence) by some other manner.
In short, is there any reason to believe that this newly discovered planet has a higher probability of containing "life" than a hot, waterless planet or a frozen ice-planet?




"This is from the DailyTech.com. It's a science website." -- Rush Limbaugh











botimage
Copyright 2012 DailyTech LLC. - RSS Feed | Advertise | About Us | Ethics | FAQ | Terms, Conditions & Privacy Information | Kristopher Kubicki