Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Earth-size Kepler-186f

NASA ^ | April 19, 2014 | (see photo credit)

[SunkenCiv]

Explanation: Planet Kepler-186f is the first known Earth-size planet to lie within the habitable zone of a star beyond the Sun. Discovered using data from the prolific planet-hunting Kepler spacecraft, the distant world orbits its parent star, a cool, dim, M dwarf star about half the size and mass of the Sun, some 500 light-years away in the constellation Cygnus. M dwarfs are common, making up about 70 percent of the stars in our Milky Way galaxy. To be within the habitable zone, where surface temperatures allowing liquid water are possible, Kepler-186f orbits close, within 53 million kilometers (about the Mercury-Sun distance) of the M dwarf star, once every 130 days. Four other planets are known in the distant system. All four are only a little larger than Earth and in much closer orbits, also illustrated in the tantalizing artist's vision. While the size and orbit of Kepler-186f are known, its mass and composition are not, and can't be determined by Kepler's transit technique. Still, models suggest that it could be rocky and have an atmosphere, making it potentially the most Earth-like exoplanet discovered so far ...

[Vaquero]

Then their is the Murcheson meteorite which plowed into Australia in 1969.

Murchison contains common amino acids such as glycine, alanine and glutamic acid as well as unusual ones like isovaline and pseudoleucine. A complex mixture of alkanes was isolated as well, similar to that found in the Miller–Urey experiment. Serine and threonine, usually considered to be earthly contaminants, were conspicuously absent in the samples. A specific family of amino acids called diamino acids was identified in the Murchison meteorite as well

I'm not a doctor, nor do I play one on TV, but between this, the clouds of stuff like ethanol floating through space and the ‘Drake Equation’, I would say the chances are pretty good for life to exist elsewhere in the galaxy. (Other life in the solar system is a given to me as chunks of this globe have been scattered via asteroid and comet strikes throughout the system for 4.5 billion years and extremophiles can withstand the vacuum of space and places like Europa and Enceladus are ripe for colonization )

[Vinnie]

Guess I should have incorporated the /s tag.

[crazylibertarian]

But then also, when you write ‘intelligent life such as our own,’ are you sure we qualify as intelligent life? We elected Barack H. Obama president. (Yuk! Yuk! Yuk!)

[Telepathic Intruder]

I never suggested that voters for Obama were intelligent.

[HartleyMBaldwin]

Or I should have.

[TheOldLady]

Wow! All that and only 500 light years away!

I better pack.

[martin_fierro]

the distant world orbits its parent star, a cool, dim, M dwarf star