First habitable planet outside solar system is found

[Xanthine]

By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 29, 2010; 9:14 PM

For the first time, astronomers have detected a rocky planet in another solar system that has the most basic and essential conditions needed to support extraterrestrial life.

The presence of Earth-like exoplanets in what is called the "habitable zone" has been predicted for some time, but actually identifying and measuring one was referred to Wednesday as the beginning of a new era in the search for life beyond Earth.

"This is our first Goldilocks planet - just the right size and the right distance from its sun," said astronomer and "planet-hunter" Paul Butler with the Carnegie Institution of Washington. "A threshold has been reached."

The planet, called Gliese 581G, is quite close at 20 light years from Earth's solar system. It is considered to be in the habitable zone because of its distance from its sun and its size.

Together, those two measurements tell scientists that any water on the planet will be in liquid form, and that the planet is large enough to have the gravitational pull to hold an atmosphere around it.

Butler and colleague Steven Vogt of the University of California at Santa Cruz said their discovery, which was published in the Astrophysical Journal, was pieced together by collecting data over 11 years, does not mean that life necessarily exists on the planet. Rather, they said, the basic conditions are present to allow it to begin and keep it going. And from their research, they strongly believe similar conditions are present in many other solar systems.

"This is clearly one of the most exciting areas of science these days," said Edward Seidel of the National Science Foundation, which has helped support Butler's work for almost 25 years. "If we do discover life outside our planet, it would perhaps be the most significant discovery of all time."

Adding to the significance of the discovery, the star Gliese 581 is now known to have six and perhaps seven planets orbiting it. And unlike most distant solar systems detected so far, the planets all orbit in a circular path and are lined up by type in a way similar to our solar system.

"As we collect more data, we can see the system looks like our own - with an inner clutch of rocky, terrestrial planets and then a big loner like Jupiter further out," Vogt said.

It is significantly different, however, because the central sun is an M dwarf, a star with only 1 percent of the power that comes off Earth's sun. All the planets in the system are closer to their sun than the Earth is to its sun.

Butler and Vogt said the likelihood of finding many more planets in habitable zones has greatly increased because of where this first one was found and how long it took to find it. Gliese 581 is one of the stars closest to Earth (86th in distance from our solar system), and so is one of the easiest to study for exoplanets. In addition, it took 11 years of observing to tease out the presence of the habitable zone planet, a short time in astronomical terms.

"The logic now says there are lots of planets like this out there," Vogt said

rest of thew story is here.... http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...092907492.html

[deathknell3000]

When will they find Krypton?

[Dave]

i wonder if steroids are legal on that planet?

[Enigma]

If life allegedly evolved to fit the planet then it is not necessary for a planet to be like ours to have life. Another contradiction.

[Thiago]

Let's hurry up and extract all its resources and shit it up.

[Xanthine]

If life allegedly evolved to fit the planet then it is not necessary for a planet to be like ours to have life. Another contradiction.

I agree...we are carbon based but why not silicon based life forms or gaseous? The idea we already know everything is the ultimate in hubris. No matter who says it.

[Thiago]

If only we could conquer the warp engine, artificial gravity and cosmic radiation, we could have found all this out for ourselves by now.

Why couldnt I live in the future and be like Captain Picard? Work for no money to spread the communist ideology of The Federation of Planets?!!!

[Xanthine]

If only we could conquer the warp engine, artificial gravity and cosmic radiation, we could have found all this out for ourselves by now.

Why couldnt I live in the future and be like Captain Picard? Work for no money to spread the communist ideology of The Federation of Planets?!!!

The real reason we haven't been able to work that out, I believe, is our refusal as a species to wear neck to ankle spandex. If we can overcome that, we may go where no man has gone before

[Thiago]

The real reason we haven't been able to work that out, I believe, is our refusal as a species to wear neck to ankle spandex. If we can overcome that, we may go where no man has gone before

^^ MISOGYNIE!!!

Hey, you ever watch Stargate Atlantis with Dr Weir? This bitch has the nerve to say 'Humankind' instead of "Mankind". WTF?

Next it will be Woe2mankind.

[Fautass]

If life allegedly evolved to fit the planet then it is not necessary for a planet to be like ours to have life. Another contradiction.

It's not necessary, however the scientists feel it is 'most likely' that another planet with life would resemble ours. I've read a couple different things on this topic, and while this article reads very "matter of factly", most scientists I've heard from agree with the 'most likely' view . Why use all these resources looking for 'exotic' forms of extraterrestrial life when they can narrow the search to planets most like ours.

Honestly, who knows what other types of life could be out there...Xanthine is right, just because we know carbon based life doesn't mean that's all there could be. Scientists just really love water as the solvent of choice.

[mangler65]

It's too bad that Obama is shutting down various NASA programs, I would really like to see the USA take the lead in space exploration. It baffles me beyond description that people don't see any importance in NASA and space exploration. This discovery is exciting, and there are more to come. The launching point into space is near, but will it be in our lifetimes? Not at the pace we are going now. If we took all the money we spent on bailouts and wars and budgeted it for NASA instead, we would have more than enough for a robust space program. Maybe Russia or the EU or some private company will let us tag along when they get going on their's.

[Thiago]

Doubtful either way. There is a reason they dont bother leaving close Earth orbit. No Mars or Moon missions are possible. They can't design a material that can protect against the random Cosmic radiation that the Sun emits which would kill astronauts instantly.

[Enigma]

It's not necessary, however the scientists feel it is 'most likely' that another planet with life would resemble ours. I've read a couple different things on this topic, and while this article reads very "matter of factly", most scientists I've heard from agree with the 'most likely' view . Why use all these resources looking for 'exotic' forms of extraterrestrial life when they can narrow the search to planets most like ours.

Honestly, who knows what other types of life could be out there...Xanthine is right, just because we know carbon based life doesn't mean that's all there could be. Scientists just really love water as the solvent of choice.

It isnt most likely if they really believe in evolution because the basic tennet of evolution is that the life evolves according to the environment which can be anything. To state that life is more likely to be on planets similar to ours contradicts their own belief and supports the ID tennet that earth is unique to support life. There is nothing exotic about non earth life forms according to their own belief system since all life originates and evolves according to their belief of random mutations being selected by the environment. -1 for the almighty scientists

[mangler65]

Back to ArticleClick to PrintWednesday, Sep. 29, 2010
Found: An Earthlike Planet at Last
By Michael D. Lemonick

The star known as Gliese 581 is utterly unremarkable in just about every way you can imagine. It's a red dwarf, the most common type of star in the Milky Way, weighing in at about a third the mass of the Sun. At 20 light years or so away, it's relatively nearby, but not close enough to set any records (it's the 117th closest star to Earth, for what that's worth). You can't even see it without a telescope, so while it lies in direction of Libra, it isn't one of the shining dots you'd connect to form the constellation. It's no wonder that the star's name lacks even a whiff of mystery or romance.

But Gliese 581 does have one distinction — and that's enough to make it the focus of intense scientific attention. At last count, astronomers had identified more than 400 planets orbiting stars beyond the Sun, and Gliese 581 was host to no fewer than four of them — the most populous solar system we know of, aside than our own. That alone would make the star intriguing. But on Wednesday, a team of astronomers announced they'd found two more planets circling the star, bringing the total to six. And one of them, assigned the name Gliese 581g, may be of truly historic significance. (See an illustrated history of Planet Earth.)

For one thing, the planet is only about three or four times as massive as our home world, meaning it probably has a solid surface just like Earth. Much more important, it sits smack in the middle of the so-called habitable zone, orbiting at just the right distance from the star to let water remain liquid rather than freezing solid or boiling away. As far as we know, that's a minimum requirement for the presence of life. For thousands of years, philosophers and scientists have wondered whether other Earths existed out in the cosmos. And since the first, very un-Eearthlike extrasolar planet was discovered in 1995, astronomers have been inching closer to answering that question. Now, they've evidently succeeded (although to be clear, there's no way at this point to determine whether there actually is life on the new planet).

"We're pretty excited about it," admits Steve Vogt, of the University of California, Santa Cruz, a member of the team, in a masterpiece of understatement. "I think this is what everyone's been after for the past 15 years." (See the top 50 space moments since Sputnik.)

Planetary scientist James Kasting, of Penn State University, who wasn't involved with the discovery, agrees. "I think they've scooped the Kepler people," he says. Kasting refers to the Kepler space telescope, launched into space early last year on a mission to determine how common Earthlike planets might be. The "Kepler people" have a number of candidate Earths in the can, but are still working to confirm them. (See pictures of Earth from space.)

Being first isn't the main reason Vogt is excited, however. "Someone had to be first," he says. "But this is right next door to us. That's the big result." What's particularly big about it is a matter of simple arithmetic. With only 116 stars closer to Earth than this one, it was hardly a sure thing that so small a sample group would produce two habitable planets, including Earth. And two such planets may be an undercount, Vogt says, since just nine out of those 100-plus stars have been studied in any detail. Indeed, one of Gliese 581g's sister planets, known as Gliese 581d (OK, they truly don't put a lot of creative energy into naming these things) could conceivably be a habitable world itself.

One of the four planets known to orbit Gliese 581 before the latest discovery, 581d was found by a team of Swiss astronomers in 2007 and was thought to be outside the habitable zone, and thus too cold for liquid water. But a reanalysis last year brought it into the zone, albeit just barely. The problem is, Gliese 581d is also too big to be Earthlike; it's probably made mostly of nonwater ice, like Neptune and Uranus, which makes a poorer candidate for life than 581g.

Lost in the excitement over possible life on the new world is what a remarkable achievement its mere discovery was. Detecting a planet this small is monstrously hard—and would have been impossible when Vogt and co-discoverer Paul Butler, of the Carnegie Institution of Washington first got into the planet-hunting game in the early 1990s. The instruments you use to detect tiny back-and-forth motions in the star — motions caused by the orbiting planet's gravitational tugs, which are often the only way to infer that the worlds exist at all—simply weren't sensitive enough. Since then, though, says Vogt, "I've been busting my gut to improve the instruments, and Paul has been busting his got to do the observations." In all, those observations span more than 200 nights on the giant Keck I telescope in Hawaii over 11 years, supplemented by observations from the Geneva group — and that painstaking work finally confirmed 581g's existence.

None of this proves that there actually is water on Gliese 581g. "Those are things we just have to speculate about," says Vogt. But he goes on to point out that there's water pretty much everywhere else you look. "There's water on Earth," he says, "and on the Moon, and Mars, and on Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Enceladus, and in interstellar space. There's enough water produced in the Orion Nebula every 24 seconds to fill the Earth's oceans."

It's not hard to imagine, in other words, that Gliese 581g might have plenty of water as well. "It could have quite a good ocean," Vogt says. Certainly, it could still be a sterile, non-biological ocean. But unlike any planet found until now, there's nothing to rule out the idea that could also be teeming with life.

See pictures of five nations' space programs.

See pictures of Saturn.

Click to PrintFind this article at:
http://www.time.com/time/health/arti...022489,00.html

[mangler65]

There's enough water produced in the Orion Nebula every 24 seconds to fill the Earth's oceans."

I did not know this, fasacinating!

[Xanthine]

I did not know this, fasacinating!

It's amazing isn't it?

re: your post about funding; I wonder if it's because today's politicians, the world over, are incapable of thinking, planning and acting outside of concerns about their "next term"?

[Deuce]

I did not know this, fasacinating!

I was gonna say. Thats hard to imagine. I mean damn, thats a lotta fuckin water. And in a mere 24 seconds?

[Fautass]

It isnt most likely if they really believe in evolution because the basic tennet of evolution is that the life evolves according to the environment which can be anything. To state that life is more likely to be on planets similar to ours contradicts their own belief and supports the ID tennet that earth is unique to support life. There is nothing exotic about non earth life forms according to their own belief system since all life originates and evolves according to their belief of random mutations being selected by the environment. -1 for the almighty scientists

Evolution: "The origin of life is a necessary precursor for biological evolution, but understanding that evolution occurred once organisms appeared and investigating how this happens does not depend on understanding exactly how life began."

Once again your lack of knowledge regarding evolution is apparent. Evolution makes NO claims regarding the origin of life...So...you're wrong. If life exists in a more 'exotic' environment, evolution is taking place. But evolution makes no claim that there should be life in all environments.

[Fautass]

It's amazing isn't it?

re: your post about funding; I wonder if it's because today's politicians, the world over, are incapable of thinking, planning and acting outside of concerns about their "next term"?

I have a feeling it's not just the politicians, most citizens can't think that far ahead so why should they?

[Enigma]

Evolution: "The origin of life is a necessary precursor for biological evolution, but understanding that evolution occurred once organisms appeared and investigating how this happens does not depend on understanding exactly how life began."

Once again your lack of knowledge regarding evolution is apparent. Evolution makes NO claims regarding the origin of life...So...you're wrong. If life exists in a more 'exotic' environment, evolution is taking place. But evolution makes no claim that there should be life in all environments.

I never said that life should be in all environments, you misunderstood and I know that evolution is not proposed as the origin of life. Having said that, it seems you are agreeing with the tennet of ID which states that earth is uniquely suited to originate life. On the other side of your mouths you guys say, it could be any kind of planet earth is not unique, then this article says they are looking for planets like earth.

The point being, if the earth is not unique either to originate or evolve life then why are they looking for planets like earth? If it is unique then they have something in common with ID. I just dont like it when they telll ID that it isnt unique, then when they look for life they look on planets like earth. They should put their money where their mouth is.

[Fautass]

I never said that life should be in all environments, you misunderstood and I know that evolution is not proposed as the origin of life. Having said that, it seems you are agreeing with the tennet of ID which states that earth is uniquely suited to originate life. On the other side of your mouths you guys say, it could be any kind of planet earth is not unique, then this article says they are looking for planets like earth.

The point being, if the earth is not unique either to originate or evolve life then why are they looking for planets like earth? If it is unique then they have something in common with ID. I just dont like it when they telll ID that it isnt unique, then when they look for life they look on planets like earth. They should put their money where their mouth is.

I understand what you're saying. Most of the planets in the universe are most likely not earth-like. However, there are probably still hundreds of billions or even trillions of earth-like planets. (Considering there are trillions of galaxies, each with billions or even several trillion stars each). Percentage wise I have a hard time saying that we aren't unique...but it's also hard to say we're unique when there are possibly several trillion other planets very similar to ours.

Bottom line, we have definitive proof that life can exist in the "goldilocks zone" (Since we're here) So why not start your search by looking there.

[Enigma]

when you speak of numbers such as trillions of galaxies each with billions of components and then maintain that life came into being without any intent and it was purely random, then that is to say that it is a mathematical certainty that there is other life somewhere else. Infinite time, infinite space, infinite matter eventually the lemons and oranges are going to line up and there will be a winner. Its inevitable. IF you believe in random universe. Everything is random. Everything. Even things we do on purpose are ultimately random because we are a result of random. The only thing constant is energy. Can we even define what energy is?

[Thiago]

when you speak of numbers such as trillions of galaxies each with billions of components and then maintain that life came into being without any intent and it was purely random, then that is to say that it is a mathematical certainty that there is other life somewhere else. Infinite time, infinite space, infinite matter eventually the lemons and oranges are going to line up and there will be a winner. Its inevitable. IF you believe in random universe. Everything is random. Everything. Even things we do on purpose are ultimately random because we are a result of random. The only thing constant is energy. Can we even define what energy is?

That is the M theory, isnt it? String theory? Multiple parallel universes where everything has happened somewhere.

[Enigma]

IDK string theory has something to do infinitely dividable energy or something , i have no idea. Im only talking about laws of probability. Not that I believe it is random because I generally do not. Im saying that if the scientists truly believe there is no intent to the universe or life, then given the infinity of time and space, EVERYTHING is a certainty because eventually it will happpen somewhere and some point in time.

[donkeypunch76]

I'm in
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gcusl4jv2_U&feature=player_embedded"]YouTube - The Alien Fleshlight Returns[/ame]

[Breitling]

The point being, if the earth is not unique either to originate or evolve life then why are they looking for planets like earth? If it is unique then they have something in common with ID. I just dont like it when they telll ID that it isnt unique, then when they look for life they look on planets like earth. They should put their money where their mouth is.

We know for a FACT that life exists on earth. It makes sense to look for earth-like planets if we're looking for life elsewhere. Maybe someday we'll find silicon based life that lives in oceans of liquid nitrogen, but it doesn't mean that ID is a fact just because scientists are looking for earth-like planets.

[Enigma]

We know for a FACT that life exists on earth. It makes sense to look for earth-like planets if we're looking for life elsewhere.

Not when they theorize that the earth is not unique and that life can be anywhere. Wouldnt it make more sense to look at planets closer to earth instead of so far away? Just admit, the Earth is unique and life is unique to earth.

Maybe someday we'll find silicon based life that lives in oceans of liquid nitrogen, but it doesn't mean that ID is a fact just because scientists are looking for earth-like planets.

never said it did, but it does show that the earth is unique and they should admit that and not use that as an argument against ID that the earth is not unique.

.................

[Fautass]

.................

If you consider earth unique...when potentially 1,000,000,000,000 planets can be just as 'unique' as earth...then you're right. Just for the record, I'm not THAT unique.

[Enigma]

Unique in the context of originating and supporting life is what I meant.

[MaNiFeSt]

very cool...

i've said it before and one of the things i hope to witness before i die is the existence of extraterrestrial life...

[TheManlord]

watch them realize its a bunch of humans on that planet without the myostatin gene

[TheDude]

If life allegedly evolved to fit the planet then it is not necessary for a planet to be like ours to have life. Another contradiction.

The planet isn't like ours it's colder...However if a planet is too cold cells freeze. So there are some variables that need to be in place for life to flourish.

However, the requirements for a habitat to be suitable for life are always be modified. We keep finding life where it isn't expected. e.g. Deep sea near volcanic gasses. They now suspect there may be life on some of Jupiter's moons.

[TheDude]

I agree...we are carbon based but why not silicon based life forms or gaseous? The idea we already know everything is the ultimate in hubris. No matter who says it.

There are theories of non-carbon based life forms. Just because we haven't seen it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Like you said, we don't know everything. I would say we know VERY little. We can't say where we came from nor can we come up laws of physics that work on both large and small scales.

[Enigma]

.. I would say we know VERY little.

this. too little in fact to make authoritative statements about our origins

[Fautass]

this. too little in fact to make authoritative statements about our origins

Doesn't stop you.






hahahaha...we had a good run of agreement in two other threads, but every good thing must come to an end.

[Enigma]

haha... ad hominem attempt. .. you lose.

Im not the one claiming to be an authority, they are. Im just a regular guy with a dissenting opinion.

[Xanthine]

I heard about a world with nothing but shrimp. Google it.

[Enigma]

How big are the shrimp? big enough to eat a man?

[deathknell3000]

I heard about a world with nothing but shrimp. Google it.

They could build a giant Red Lobster there and have Endless Shrimp all year!

[Fautass]

They could build a giant Red Lobster there and have Endless Shrimp all year!

Bubba beat you to it.