First habitable Earth like planet outside Solar System discovered

Zeenews.com ^ | April 24, 2007

[navyblue]

Are they selling any beach front lots yet? Lemme call my real estate agent.

[Diggity]

They are much cooler and have much longer life spans.

John

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_dwarf

[Diggity]

They are much cooler and have much longer life spans.

John

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_dwarf

[zavvone]

Hey!! I’m not giving up my 4 weeks of vacation a year!!!

[Diggity]

Our governemnt has been lying for decades about UFO’s. You can’t trust anything NASA says.

John

[jpl]

I’m not sure if I could handle the seasons changing like every three days!

[spunkets]

"I don’t know about “habitable”, though. I’d weigh 1000 lbs! "

Then you must weight 450lbs here. LOL! A 200lb person would weight 444lbs on that planet, so the planet's not habitable. The story's poorly written, but the weight factor is 5/1.5²=2.2.

[Sam Cree]

Does it have tides, I wonder.

[lafroste]

models predict that the planet should be either rocky – like our Earth – or covered with oceans,” he said.

The last time I looked, the Earth was rocky AND covered with oceans. Why do they think it must be one or the other, but not both?

[lepton]

which has a mass about five times that of the Earth and orbits a red dwarf

5 Gs is a lot. 2 Gs is probably beyond habitation specs.

[Sam Cree]

"This is why I totally mistrust all news stories in the media that have to do with science."

And all news stories that have to do with anything else, for that matter.

[lepton]

The story's poorly written, but the weight factor is 5/1.52=2.2.

I don't think that's quite right. Your equation supposes that the mass is all at a singular point and that you are suspended/supported on a massless sphere 1.5 earth radii away. To figure it out precisely, you may need to include rotation speed as well (depending upon whether it is fast enough to be significant).

[Dead Corpse]

White Dwarf made for SciFi movie.

"Two great ladies will catch your fall, they are the ones who catch us all. Their children kept them far apart; the Lady Light, the Lady Dark. Dark broken, light storm, dead spoken, dreams torn... and we will bring you home."

[MooseMan]

It needs a moon to have tides.

How fast does it rotate on its axis?

What is the angle of its axis?

I bet they're really strong there.

[Godebert]

"5 Gs is a lot. 2 Gs is probably beyond habitation specs."

Does the mass of the planet directly corelate to the atmosheric pressure?

[Godebert]

atmospheric......

[colorado tanker]

It would be really cool if they found Risa, but they probably found the Rigil System.

[Woodman]

IRRC Gravity would be a function of mass. Since we don’t know the density of the planet, weight is indeterminable.

[x]

Start spreading the news
I'm leaving today
I want to be a part of it,
Earth-like planet 20 light years away
That's very likely to contain water on its surface

I'll make a brand new start of it
On old Gliese 581
If I can make it there
I'll make it anywhere
It's up to you, Earth-like planet 20 light years away
That's very likely to contain water on its surface .

[Centurion2000]

“We have estimated that the mean temperature of this super-Earth lies between 0 and 40 degrees Celsius, and water would thus be liquid,” said Stéphane Udry from the Geneva Observatory, Switzerland and lead-author of the paper in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics.

“Moreover, its radius should be only 1.5 times the Earth’s radius, and models predict that the planet should be either rocky – like our Earth – or covered with oceans,” he said.

AWESOME .... probably about 2 - 2.5G on the surface but if it's got liquid water it's got life.

What's ironic as hell is that red dwarfs are the most common star out there. We could be the exception (having a main sequence star primary) rather than the rule.

Of course it's probably tidally locked which will limit the habitable portions of the planet as well.

Weather patterns should be interesting as well.