'Indirect' detection The exoplanet - as astronomers call planets around a star other than the Sun - is the smallest yet found, and completes a full orbit of its parent star in just 13 days. Indeed, it is 14 times closer to its star than the Earth is to our Sun. However, given that the host star is smaller and colder than the Sun - and thus less luminous - the planet nevertheless lies in the "habitable zone", the region around a star where water could be liquid. Gliese 581 is much cooler and dimmer than our own Sun Gliese 581 was identified at the European Southern Observatory (Eso) facility at La Silla in the Atacama Desert. To make their discovery, researchers used a very sensitive instrument that can measure tiny changes in the velocity of a star as it experiences the gravitational tug of a nearby planet. Astronomers are stuck with such indirect methods of detection because current telescope technology struggles to image very distant and faint objects - especially when they orbit close to the glare of a star. The Gliese 581 system has now yielded three planets: the new super-Earth, a 15 Earth-mass planet orbiting even closer to the parent star, and an eight Earth-mass planet that lies further out. Future observatories will study exoplanets for signs of biology The latest discovery has created tremendous excitement among scientists. Of the more than 200 exoplanets so far discovered, a great many are Jupiter-like gas giants that experience blazing temperatures because they orbit close to hot stars. The Gliese 581 super-Earth is in what scientists call the "Goldilocks Zone" where temperatures "are just right" for life to have a chance to exist. Commenting on the discovery, Alison Boyle, the curator of astronomy at London's Science Museum, said: "Of all the planets we've found around other stars, this is the one that looks as though it might have the right ingredients for life. "It's 20 light-years away and so we won't be going there anytime soon, but with new kinds of propulsion technology that could change in the future. And obviously we'll be training some powerful telescopes on it to see what we can see," she told BBC News. "'Is there life anywhere else?' is a fundamental question we all ask." [/b] Information Obtain from : http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6589157.stm
I think people are saying that it will be the end of stupid religious people who believe in Intelligent Design and that the Earth is only 6000 years old, etc. etc. Which is of course not true. The crazies will adapt and evolve. For example, they might say the same thing they say about fossil evidence: "God put the aliens there as a test of our faith!" find it offensive to think that only such planet with earth like qualities could support life. Hell, why can't life evolve on an ice cold planet? Why can't life evolve in a vocano? Why does life has to be carbon based organic and contains DNA? For all we know space debris can from orderly shape and be a space race transformers! Abit narrow minded there T_T But yeah it's a cool planet, I'd like a visit there to do some intensive work out.
It won't take long to destroy that planet too, if people are planning to move there, and if the US joins in it's gone 3x faster.
It'll be a cold day in hell if we get there any time soon. The planet's 20.5 light years away. The farthest thing from Earth -- that we have launched -- is 0.002 light years away, and that's after being out there for 30 years. It will take so much for us to simple observe this planet, let alone visit it. We haven't even been on Mars yet. -_-
Yes, the United States is on a mission to ruin people's lives and send us all into the threshold of hell... Merged Post: I got this from another website, but it's mind boggling none the less.... Those lines are beams of sunlight.
I don't see why a newsflash like this immediately evolves into a religious thing and into blaming another country for mistakes we all make. We screwed up together, offcourse we all blame another person for destroying the flora and fauna, but we all breath, so we all add to the carbondioxide problem. 1 country make a difference, you'll need at least 95% of the countries to make a difference. Otherwise the problem will just be focused at one point, and that doesn't solve anything. It's great to see that they are getting somewhere, and i'm sure i would join if someone told me i could go on a mission to this new planet (offcourse using a different accellerator then the very expensive fuel-rockets). Even if it would take another 80 years to get there (with a very good chance that i died before i got there). I can't wait untill they launch the new telescope (much more stronger then hubble). It would be awesome to see a picture in color from an earthlike planet, or even a sun for that matter. Things are going more rapidly every year, but it's still way out of our league to expect to get there within the next 100 years. It will take thousands of years before the first mission will set off. We first need to invent a good power to give us the needed speed, then we have to refine it, untill it's usable in a smaller scale. (for example, you would need a building with the space of an entire footballfield in order to fuse or split 1 atom/core. You can't integrate it into a spaceship yet. After you invented the power, you would need to come up with a suitable spaceship, Large enough to host everything needed for a trip that would last for at least 20 years. If we invent a drive powerfull enough to get to the speed of light, it would still take at least 40 years to recieve the first message from that mission. 20 years to get there, and 20 years for the message to get back. And believe me, a speed near the speed of light is needed, otherwise the first mission would arrive at the same time as the second mission (set off many years after the first one, but using a new power which makes it able to travel at a higher speed), not to mention the amount of time, and the effects of weightlessness. The people aboard would travel for generations, the people that arive on the planet wouldn't be able to survive, because they adapted to weithlessness.
Nice theory, but I doubt people would adapt to weightlessness in 20 years At the end of the day, even though you are travelling at the speed of light, to you time will still move at the same speed Therefore, you wont have enough time to adapt. Sure you will be used to it, and it will be a pain in the arse getting used to gravity again, but it wont be a major problem
so, name one planet which we as a human population have render incapable of hosting life... also, why is it that the the EU has experience great deterioration of natural resources compared the US?
as soon as there is a flight to there im takeing the first one there and getting off this planet before we distroy it
i already heard about this !! AWESOM ! now we can fly to the another planet which is better than this idiot world, keep idiots here and go to the new world
Thats crazy. Since thee earth is gonna be gone eventually, we will probably move there and meet up with aliens, CAUSE THEY ARE REAL.
