[NormsRevenge]

Great!!!

How many box tops does it take to get there?

[Veggie Todd]

[Bringbackthedraft]

The planet designated Kepler-186f, however, is earth-sized and orbits within the star’s habitable zone. ................................ Well I guess there isn’t a rush to go buy property there at the moment. I guess when we run out of oil, we’ll have to look for it there. I’m sure we don’t have to rush, its only 500 light years away. I’m sure as the years go by there will be many more livable planets found. At the same time, someone or something out there may be looking at our planet for the same reasons we are looking at theirs.

[airborne]

Steve Howell, Kepler's Project Scientist and a co-author on the paper, adds that neither Kepler (nor any telescope) is currently able to directly spot an exoplanet of this size and proximity to its host star. "However, what we can do is eliminate essentially all other possibilities so that the validity of these planets is really the only viable option."

And we all know how honest and accurate scientific guesses are.

[Gefn]

Wow!

[GeronL]

I’m packing. When does my ride get here?

[CdMGuy]

I’m over 70. They need to perfect cryogenics before I can board the rocket ship.

[The Toll]

Will I have to support parasitic scum or be free?

[RoosterRedux]

I volunteer! Get me outta here.

[Larry381]

I remember watching a BBC science program years ago in which a scientist or an astronomer when asked what he thought of SETI programs and programs such as Voyager.
He remarked that maybe they seemed a great idea at the time but he wondered just how smart it was to advertise the precise location of planet earth.

[ETL 2]

The planet’s atmospheric composition could potentially be determined via a process known as mass spectroscopy if it moved in front of a bright background light source such as the host star.

[ETL 2]

“The reflected light of a planet contains absorption bands due to minerals in the rocks present for rocky bodies, or due to the elements and molecules present in the atmospheres of gas giants. To date almost 1000 exoplanets have been discovered. These include so-called Hot Jupiters, as well as Earth-like planets. Using spectroscopy, compounds such as alkali metals, water vapor, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and methane have all been discovered.[54]”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomical_spectroscopy#Planets
__________________________

“Transmission spectroscopy is a technique used to gather details about the chemical composition and the extent of the atmosphere of a transiting exoplanet. As the light from the host star passes through the atmosphere of the planet, some of the light is absorbed by the atoms, molecules or grains present in the atmosphere, making the exoplanet appear bigger. A plot of the size of the exoplanet as a function of wavelength gives a transmission spectrum. The shape of the transmission spectrum itself then can indicate which components are present in the atmosphere. An example of a transmission spectrum is shown below.

Transmission spectroscopy has been used to extensively to study the atmospheres of HD 209458 b and HD 189733 b amongst many other transiting planets”

http://www.exoclimes.com/topics/transmission-spectroscopy/