"What exactly is a habitable zone? What would you recommend I read to find out more?"
Content with the tag: “exoplanets”
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New Extrasolar Planetary System May Be Much Like Our Own
Researchers from the NAI’s University of Arizona Team have published a new study in the current issue of Astrophysical Journal Letters of the potential habitability of the extrasolar planetary system OGLE-2006-BLG-109L. The first multiple-planet system ever to be discovered by gravitational microlensing, it has two large planets similar to Jupiter and Saturn. It’s possible that the system harbors other planets, including Earth-like planets, that are beyond the sensitivity...
July 18, 2008 / Posted by: Daniella Scalice
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Calling All Exoplanet Hunters….
Extrasolar planet (exoplanet) discoveries are on the rise, to the point where it is a challenge to keep up with new findings. Those who are interested in keeping up with exoplanet discoveries can turn to free public databases maintained by NASA and other organizations.
The NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s PlanetQuest Web site keeps a tally of exoplanet discoveries (as of June 27, 2008: 303 exoplanets, 259 stars with planets, 0 Earthlike planets)....
June 27, 2008 / Written by: Linda Billings
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Discovering Earth-like Exoplanets
In this week’s Science, astrobiologists from NAI’s University of Hawai’i Team review the prospects for discovering smaller planets more like Earth, some of which may even have conditions suitable for life. Improved techniques and the ability to monitor fainter stars now enable astronomers to discover smaller planets, particularly planets orbiting much closer to their host star than the Earth is to the Sun. This review article is based on an NAI-supported session at the May, 2007 meeting of...
October 10, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Exoplanet Water Vapor and Weird Life
A new article in the Wall Street Journal ties together new discoveries from the frontiers of astrobiology science. The author speculates that “Our knowledge of the universe we call home — and the search for water worlds hospitable to life — is expanding almost as quickly as the cosmos itself.”
August 5, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Water Vapor Detected on Extrasolar Planet
An international team of researchers including members of NAI’s Virtual Planetary Laboratory Team have, using NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope, detected the presence of water vapor on the hot jupiter HD 189733b. Published in this week’s Nature, the study’s primary author, Giovanna Tinetti, was a 2003 NAI Postdoctoral Fellow.
July 10, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Found: Earth-Like Planet
A rocky planet not much larger than Earth has been detected orbiting a star close to our own neighborhood in the Milky Way, and the European astronomers who found it say it lies within the star’s “habitable zone,” where life could exist, possibly in oceans of water.
April 30, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Technology Improves Imaging of Exoplanets
Imaging Earth-like exoplanets is a daunting challenge because the dim starlight that such relatively small worlds reflect is easily overpowered by the glare of their far larger, brighter parent stars. Now two astrophysicists at JPL have devised new techniques that can overcome this glare, enabling future space telescopes to snap pictures of Earth-like exoplanets up to 10 billion times fainter than the stars they orbit.
April 17, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Final Assembly of Earth-Like Planets
NAI Postdoctoral Fellow Sean Raymond leads a team of authors from NAI’s University of Colorado, Boulder, and University of Arizona Teams, and Virtual Planetary Laboratory and University of Washington Alumni Teams in a new publication in Astrobiology. They present analysis of water delivery and planetary habitability in 5 high-resolution simulations forming 15 terrestrial planets. Their results outline a new model for water delivery to terrestrial planets in dynamically calm systems, which may be very common in the Galaxy.
April 16, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Spectra of Two Extrasolar Planets
Researchers from NAI’s Carnegie Institution of Washington and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Teams have a new paper in Nature describing the infrared spectrum of exoplanet HD 209458b as obtained by the NASA Spitzer Space Telescope. Scientists from NAI’s University of Arizona and Alumni Virtual Planetary Laboratory Teams are contributing authors on a similar paper in Astrophysical Journal Letters which details the spectrum of exoplanet HD 189733b. Both sets of results show relatively flat spectra, with...
February 25, 2007 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Exoplanet Weather
Researchers from NAI’s UCLA, Carnegie Institution of Washington, and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Teams published this week in Science Express what may well be the first “Interstellar Weather Report.” Focusing on the innermost planet orbiting the star Upsilon Andromeda b, a hot Jupiter, the team used NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope to make measurements indicating that the temperature variation between the planets light and dark sides is 2,550 degrees Fahrenheit.
October 16, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Exotic Earths
Collaborators from NAI’s Teams at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, University of Colorado, Boulder, and Penn State as well as the former Virtual Planetary Lab Team have a paper this week in Science discussing the possible formation of “Exotic Earths.” Their models have simulated terrestrial planet growth during and after inward giant planet migration. Their results cause them to speculate that more than a third of the known systems of giant planets may harbor Earth-like planets.
September 7, 2006 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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Kepler Planet-finding Mission Selected for Discovery Program
NASA has selected the Kepler space telescope one of three candidates for NASA’s next Discovery Program mission. Kepler will search for habitable Earth-size planets around stars beyond our solar system.
January 7, 2001 / Posted by: Shige Abe
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