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Earth: no longer the lonely planet
SpaceRef ^
| 9/26/03
Posted on 09/27/2003 7:19:20 AM PDT by KevinDavis
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I think we will find a Earth like planet in 20 - 30 years. Any takers?
To: Normal4me; RightWhale; demlosers; Prof Engineer; BlazingArizona; ThreePuttinDude; Brett66; ...
Space Ping! This is the space ping list! Let me know if you want on or off this list!
2
posted on
09/27/2003 7:20:35 AM PDT
by
KevinDavis
(Let the meek inherit the Earth, the rest of us will explore the stars!)
To: KevinDavis
Make that less than 10 years.
3
posted on
09/27/2003 7:21:08 AM PDT
by
demlosers
To: KevinDavis
Are you kidding?
Haven't you heard of PN3217? If we get the right coordinates we can visit them all.
Just ask Colonel Hammond.
4
posted on
09/27/2003 7:23:36 AM PDT
by
Publius6961
(californians are as dumb as a sack of rocks.)
To: KevinDavis
I agree. How about life in the Sol system (other than earth)? I say we will find it. I don't know about 20-30 years, though.
5
posted on
09/27/2003 7:29:18 AM PDT
by
gitmo
(Zero Tolerance = Intolerance)
To: PatrickHenry
Science-ping-list ping...
6
posted on
09/27/2003 7:29:55 AM PDT
by
general_re
(SURGEON GENERAL'S WARNING: Quitting Sarcasm Now Greatly Reduces Serious Risks To Your Health.)
To: KevinDavis
I think we will find a Earth like planet in 20 - 30 years. Any takers?
Define "Earth-like." Are Venus and Mars "Earth-like?" Or will an Earth-like planet have oceans of water?
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7
posted on
09/27/2003 7:33:44 AM PDT
by
Sabertooth
(No Drivers' Licences for Illegal Aliens. Petition SB60. http://www.saveourlicense.com/n_home.htm)
To: KevinDavis
A search for habitable planets Kepler, a NASA Discovery mission, is a spaceborne telescope designed to look for Earth-like planets around stars beyond our solar system.
"The Kepler Mission will, for the first time, enable humans to search our galaxy for Earth-size or even smaller planets," said principal investigator William Borucki of NASA's Ames research Center, Moffett Field,
California. "With this cutting-edge capability, Kepler may help us answer one of the most enduring questions humans have asked throughout history: Are there others like us in the universe?"
Kepler will detect planets indirectly, using the "transit" method. A transit occurs each time a planet crosses the line-of-sight between the planet's parent star that it is orbiting and the observer. When this happens, the planet blocks some of the light from its star, resulting in a periodic dimming. This periodic signature is used to detect the planet and to determine its size and its orbit.
Three transits of a star, all with a consistent period, brightness change and duration, provide a robust method of detection and planet confirmation. The measured orbit of the planet and the known properties of the parent star are used to determine if each planet discovered is in the habitable zone; that is, at the distance from its star where liquid water could exist on the surface of the planet.
The industrial partner for development of the hardware is Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., based in Boulder, Colorado. The mission is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Scheduled to launch in 2007, Kepler will hunt for planets using a specialized one-meter diameter telescope called a photometer to measure the small changes in brightness caused by the transits.
The key technology at the heart of the photometer is a set of charged coupled devices (CCDs) that measures the brightness of hundreds of thousands of stars at the same time. CCDs are the silicon light-sensitive chips that are used in today's TV cameras, camcorders and digital cameras. Kepler must monitor many thousands of stars simultaneously, since the chance of any one planet being aligned along the line-of-sight is only about 1/2 of a percent.
Over a four-year period, Kepler will continuously view an amount of sky about equal to the size of a human hand held at arm's length or about equal in area to two "scoops" of the sky made with the Big Dipper constellation. In comparison, the Hubble Space Telescope can view only the amount of sky equal to a grain of sand held at arms length, and then only for about a half-hour at a time.
NASA selected Kepler as one of two Discovery missions from 26 proposals made in early 2001. The missions must stay within the Discovery Program's development cost cap of about $299 million. The Discovery Program emphasizes lower-cost, highly focused scientific missions.
8
posted on
09/27/2003 7:39:39 AM PDT
by
demlosers
To: KevinDavis
I think we will find a Earth like planet in 20 - 30 years. Any takers? Would it matter? Whatever we find will be too far away to have anything to do with it.
Second, the methods used to determine that a planet is "earth like" will likely disappoint you and make you question whether we've found what someone says we've found. If you think we're using powerful telescopes and actually looking at the alleged planets, guess again.
9
posted on
09/27/2003 7:40:34 AM PDT
by
Spiff
(Have you committed one random act of thoughtcrime today?)
To: KevinDavis
Watching an Ant Farm as a kid....I often wondered if they had any idea I was observing their behavior...
10
posted on
09/27/2003 7:42:37 AM PDT
by
M-cubed
To: demlosers
To: Sabertooth
You've got it.
A clear definition of the term "Earth-like" is everything.
"Earth-like" can simply mean "ball of rock and metal" as opposed to the Jupiter-like "ball of swirling gases".
What size range are we looking for? Any moons?
Is an extrasolar planet "Earth-like" if it orbits way too close or far from its parent star to support life? What if it's in an extreme orbit in a binary star system?
Does "Earth-like" presuppose a magnetic field?
And what if the candidate planet had a poisonous atmosphere (or none)?
12
posted on
09/27/2003 7:45:22 AM PDT
by
petuniasevan
(Microbiology Lab: Staph Only!)
To: demlosers
Kepler will detect planets indirectly, using the "transit" method. A transit occurs each time a planet crosses the line-of-sight between the planet's parent star that it is orbiting and the observer. When this happens, the planet blocks some of the light from its star, resulting in a periodic dimming. This periodic signature is used to detect the planet and to determine its size and its orbit. Which makes me question this whole "25% of stars have planets" thing. In order to detect an alleged planet, the planet has to pass between us and the remote star - that is, transit across the face of the star from our point of view. Now, think about that. What if we're not aligned with the ecliptic of that system. We'd never even see a single planet yet the system may have many.
And searching for rhythmic flickers in remote stars is far less glamorous than some of these articles try to make it sound in our "search for habitable planets".
Man, I must be in a bad mood or something. I love science and astronomy - I guess I just hate the hype sometimes.
13
posted on
09/27/2003 7:46:02 AM PDT
by
Spiff
(Have you committed one random act of thoughtcrime today?)
To: KevinDavis
Ok....Let's say we find it. Then what? How much do we spend on a new 'vacation paradise'? I say...they haven't bothered us, why bother them? Don't we have enough to handle here?
14
posted on
09/27/2003 7:46:20 AM PDT
by
mrtysmm
To: mrtysmm
Time to build a star ship.
To: mrtysmm
Hope you've saved up those vacation weeks at work.
It'll take a while to get to that exciting exotic Proxima II.
4.3 light-years in only 50,000,000 years if you floor it!
16
posted on
09/27/2003 7:53:43 AM PDT
by
petuniasevan
(Microbiology Lab: Staph Only!)
To: petuniasevan
Would an Earth-like planet require a Sol-like solar system? Would that Sol-like system course placidly on the galactic periphery, as ours does? Wouldn't that exclude a big chunk of the 400 billion stars in the Milky Way as candidates? Would there be lots of circular orbits, and friendly gas giants sucking up space debris along the perimeter? Would an Earth-like planet exist in what is basically a binary planetary system, as is ours with our Moon?
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17
posted on
09/27/2003 7:57:06 AM PDT
by
Sabertooth
(No Drivers' Licences for Illegal Aliens. Petition SB60. http://www.saveourlicense.com/n_home.htm)
To: KevinDavis
Do you mean a planet with intelligent life? Human life? Be more specific, please, then I might take your bet.
18
posted on
09/27/2003 7:58:01 AM PDT
by
Rocko
(Post no Clintons)
To: Sabertooth
Define "Earth-like." - Are Venus and Mars "Earth-like?" - Or will an Earth-like planet have oceans of water? Good point, but of billions and billions of planets, the prospects for ertra terrestrial life are fascinating.
To: KevinDavis
When you say 'earth-like', do you mean planet filled with idiots like this one?
20
posted on
09/27/2003 8:01:07 AM PDT
by
Chad Fairbanks
(I like my women like I like my coffee - Hot, and in a big cup)
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