A new Earth?

posted on April 25th, 2007, 1:41 am

I just found this article. Thought it's got some interesting implications, could a colonization effort be possible in the future? I've quoted it below, but here's the link:  http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=636132007.

AN EARTH-LIKE planet which could be covered in rivers, lakes and oceans and may support life has been discovered outside the solar system.

The new world, 20.5 light years away, orbits a region with the right temperature to allow liquid water on its surface.

Scientists believe it is only one-and-a-half times larger and five times more massive than Earth, making it the smallest known extra-solar planet.

But the really exciting discovery is that the planet is in the habitable zone of its parent star, Gliese 581. Also known as the "Goldilocks zone", this is the narrow orbit in which temperatures are not too hot, not too cold, but just right for surface water to exist as a liquid.

The habitable zone varies according to the star's heat output, and Gliese 581 is much smaller and colder than the Sun. So, even though the planet - known only as Gliese 581 C - is 14 times closer to the star than the Earth is to the Sun, it lies in a region where rivers and oceans are possible.

Dr Stephane Udry, from the Geneva Observatory in Switzerland, who led the European astronomers who announced the find yesterday, said: "We have estimated that the mean temperature of this super-Earth lies between zero and 40C, and water would thus be liquid. Its radius should be only 1.5 times the Earth's radius, and models predict the planet should be either rocky - like our Earth - or covered with oceans."

The vast majority of planets already discovered orbiting stars outside the solar system are giant gaseous worlds the size of Jupiter or bigger. Life as we know it could not exist on these.

But the new planet is highly unusual because it is so small, and therefore probably rocky. Given its size and location, it is likely to have an atmosphere. Scientists have also calculated the planet has about double the Earth's gravity. Any creatures living there would, be twice as heavy as they would be on Earth.

The planet, which has a 13-day orbit - or year - was discovered using the European Southern Observatory's 3.6-metre telescope at La Silla in Chile.

Astronomers employed a method of long-distance planet-finding that looks for the "wobble" on a star caused by the gravity of a large object orbiting it.

By measuring the wobble motion, shown as shifts in the star's light spectrum, astronomers are able to calculate a planet's orbit and mass. Gliese 581 C is certain to be a key target for future missions dedicated to the search for extra-terrestrial life.

"Liquid water is critical to life as we know it," Dr Xavier Delfosse, a member of the team from Grenoble University in France, said. "On the 'treasure map' of the Universe, one would be tempted to mark this planet with an X."

COROT, the first space telescope designed to search for Earth-like rocky planets around stars other than the Sun, was launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) last December. By 2020, at least one space telescope should be in orbit with the capability of detecting signs of life on planets light years from Earth.
MAELSTROM IN SPACE

THE Hubble Space Telescope has captured images of the tumultuous central region of the Carina Nebula where a maelstrom of star birth - and death - is taking place.

The image, one of the largest panoramas taken with Hubble's cameras, has been issued to mark the 17th anniversary of its launch.

The 50 light-year-wide view of the nebula shows star birth in a new level of detail. The landscape of the nebula is sculpted by outflowing winds and scorching ultraviolet radiation from the monster stars that inhabit this inferno.

In the process, the stars are shredding surrounding material that is the last vestige of the giant cloud from which they were born.

The nebula contains at least a dozen brilliant stars that are estimated to be at least 50 to 100 times the mass of our Sun.

~ The Mormon Jedi

posted on April 25th, 2007, 1:51 am

Hmmm, too bad it's so high-gravity.  But still, an amazing find!

posted on April 25th, 2007, 2:55 am

Dude...that...is...AWESOME!! 
Oh, and extra gravity is not a problem!  Imagine doing workouts over there, come back to earth and you could like carry your car over your shoulder or something.
But, wait...20.5 light years away?!?  You realise that we're probably going to be long-long-LONG dead before anyone from here gets there. 
What if there is a civilisation there?  That would be sooo cool!  We could like abduct them and do all the things people on earth think aliens are doing to them!!

Anyway, seriously, that's pretty nifty.

posted on April 25th, 2007, 4:59 am

What if there is a civilisation there?  That would be sooo cool!  We could like abduct them and do all the things people on earth think aliens are doing to them!!

How do you know they don't do exactly those things to us? 



That discovery is simply - as Mortographer already said - awesome!
No matter how far away this planet is. Its existence could already change some people's minds by proving that life in different regions of our galaxy might be more than sci-fi.

posted on April 25th, 2007, 5:10 am

Cool n ow we can destroy this one 

posted on April 25th, 2007, 1:20 pm

yeah cool, let us call it....Vulcan?

posted on April 25th, 2007, 4:13 pm

Cool n ow we can destroy this one 

Heh, pessimist.

If we're so predestined to destroy things, why do you even bother to complain about it?

posted on April 25th, 2007, 4:43 pm

It is the smallest planet ever found but it is still much larger than earth. Those small inhabitable Planets could be out there in amazing numbers, but our telescopes are not advanced enough to find them. Lets build bigger ones and resume work on nuclear powered propulsion for spaceships. Time to start Star-trekking. 

[Shril]

posted on April 25th, 2007, 5:32 pm

Last edited by Shril on April 25th, 2007, 5:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.

DAMN...too bad they found my residence for my older days...  :wheelchair:

Guess my last calm days are counted... :<

posted on April 25th, 2007, 6:27 pm

Ok then some one has probably already posted but what the heck


the planet has bean there 4 3billion years so what eva life is there has evolved to withstand the gravity
and live under groung due to the fact the BBC sed that it takes 40 years to go around the sun
imagen that 40 years of day light ow the sunburn must be bad whell so the life there can then
be very advaced and genetic engernering can fix the problem of us getting crusht on that planet

posted on April 25th, 2007, 11:18 pm

Ok then some one has probably already posted but what the heck


the planet has bean there 4 3billion years so what eva life is there has evolved to withstand the gravity
and live under groung due to the fact the BBC sed that it takes 40 years to go around the sun
imagen that 40 years of day light ow the sunburn must be bad whell so the life there can then
be very advaced and genetic engernering can fix the problem of us getting crusht on that planet

I'm not exactly sure what you mean, it takes the Earth exactly 1 year to go around the sun...that's what defines a year!!
This planet goes round its sun in 13 days, so yes, that would seem to be alot more closeness to the star-but consider that its sun is alot smaller and colder so it might not actually experience any more radiation. 
Also, we would be fine on a double-gravity planet, we just would be really uncomfortable and halve half the stamina for a couple years, but at the end come out fine (and really muscular-seriously, imagine how in-shape you would be after coming back to Earth!(except, of course, you would probably lose all of it on the journey back)).  Oh, and if you grew up there, you wouyld probably be alot shorter!

posted on April 26th, 2007, 1:33 am

Ok then some one has probably already posted but what the heck


the planet has bean there 4 3billion years so what eva life is there has evolved to withstand the gravity
and live under groung due to the fact the BBC sed that it takes 40 years to go around the sun
imagen that 40 years of day light ow the sunburn must be bad whell so the life there can then
be very advaced and genetic engernering can fix the problem of us getting crusht on that planet

Considering how unlikely it is that life even evolved on earth, I find it highly highly highly HIGHLY unlikely that anything even somehow closely RESEMBLING life would turn up anywhere in the galaxy; much less in the universe!

posted on April 26th, 2007, 8:24 am

i hate to burst peoples bubbles here, but doesnt the fact that this new sun is both smaller & colder mean its going to die sooner than the sun we already have?

but yeah this is a cool discovery, (actually saw this in the Sun newspaper BTW lol).

posted on April 26th, 2007, 12:01 pm

Smaller suns burn their fuel much slower than bigger stars, therefore they endure longer.

posted on April 26th, 2007, 6:06 pm

But with hire legals of gravity and less watter can be problems. More gravity = hire levels of arthritis and broken bonds. Less H2O less life support. If the planet is the biggest one in that solrsystim it will pull more objects in to it.