50 new exoplanets discovered

[traLika]

Well, I know it ain't politics or religion or, er, tranny porn. But I do find this stuff so exciting.

It's early days with this stuff but it's beginning to look more and more like we're not alone in the universe…

What do you all think?

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(From the BBC's web site)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14890143

Fifty new exoplanets discovered

Astronomers using a telescope in Chile have discovered 50 previously unknown exoplanets.

The bumper haul of new worlds includes 16 "super-Earths" - planets with a greater mass than our own, but below those of gas giants such as Jupiter.

One of these super-Earths orbits inside the habitable zone - the region around a star where conditions could be hospitable to life.

The planets were identified using the Harps instrument in La Silla in Chile.

The new findings are being presented at a meeting called Extreme Solar Systems in Wyoming, US, and will appear in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics.

Lead author Dr Michel Mayor, from the University of Geneva in Switzerland, said the haul included "an exceptionally rich population of super-Earths and Neptune-type planets hosted by stars very similar to our Sun".

He added: "The new results show that the pace of discovery is accelerating."
Life markers

Of the new finds, a total of five planets have masses that are less than five times that of Earth.

"These planets will be among the best targets for future space telescopes to look for signs of life in the planet's atmosphere by looking for chemical signatures such as evidence of oxygen," said Francesco Pepe, from the Geneva Observatory, who contributed to the research.
HD 85512 The star HD 85512 lies some 35 light-years away and hosts a potentially habitable planet

One of the worlds, called HD 85512 b, is estimated to be only 3.6 times the mass of the Earth.

It is located at the edge of the habitable zone - the narrow strip around a star where liquid water can be present on the surface of a planet. Liquid water is considered essential for the existence of life.

Observations with Harps have also allowed astronomers to come up with an improved estimate of the likelihood that a star such as the Sun will host low-mass planets such as the Earth (as opposed to giants such as Jupiter).

They found that about 40% of such stars have at least one planet less massive than Saturn.

Harps (High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher) is a precision instrument known as a spectrograph that is installed on the 3.6m telescope at Chile's La Silla Observatory.

The instrument searches for planets using the radial velocity method. This looks for spectral signs that a star is wobbling due to gravitational tugs from an orbiting planet.

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More stuff...

Extrasolar planets (Wikipedia)
Extrasolar planet - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia@@AMEPARAM@@/wiki/File:Fomalhaut_with_Disk_Ring_and_extrasolar_plane t_b.jpg" class="image"><img alt="" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a3/Fomalhaut_with_Disk_Ring_and_extrasolar_planet_b.j pg/250px-Fomalhaut_with_Disk_Ring_and_extrasolar_planet_b.j pg"@@AMEPARAM@@commons/thumb/a/a3/Fomalhaut_with_Disk_Ring_and_extrasolar_planet_b.j pg/250px-Fomalhaut_with_Disk_Ring_and_extrasolar_planet_b.j pg (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exoplanet)

Oh well, got that off my chest...

[trish]

Because of new advances in CCD technology, and the pioneering of different techniques for detecting extrasolar planets (measuring periodic changes in stellar luminosities, measuring periodic perturbations in a star's positions etc) it seems we're discovering new exoplanets on daily basis.
One that's making the news is "superearth" which is in the goldielocks zone and may have water:http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1947868,00.html

A discovery that that had be dancing for weeks this summer was the discovery of Earth's first "trojan" asteroid TK10. http://www.astro.uwo.ca/~wiegert/2010TK7/

[traLika]

Because of new advances in CCD technology, and the pioneering of different techniques for detecting extrasolar planets (measuring periodic changes in stellar luminosities, measuring periodic perturbations in a star's positions etc) it seems we're discovering new exoplanets on daily basis.
One that's making the news is "superearth" which is in the goldielocks zone and may have water:http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1947868,00.html


Thanks, I heard about the Gliese planets but not this one. As you say, looks like they're being discovered every day. I guess even if only a millionth of the stars in the Milky Way have planetary systems that's still a heck of a lot of planets including more potential goldilocks ones! I wouldn't be surprised, though, if we (or future generations) discover that alien life might exist and even thrive without liquid water...


A discovery that that had be dancing for weeks this summer was the discovery of Earth's first "trojan" asteroid TK10. http://www.astro.uwo.ca/~wiegert/2010TK7/ (http://www.astro.uwo.ca/%7Ewiegert/2010TK7/)


Yeah, sounds cool. I think they're looking for other ones that are a bit easier to reach…

[Stavros]

When people read about this, are they assuming that, not only may there be another planet with human life -but that it is also identical to us? I don't know how many people on HA believe in doppelgangers, I know that in one place in the UK I used to see a young woman who was more or less identical to one I knew -in the same town- I was about to say hello when I realised she didn't recognise me. More freaky, when I lived in London I went into a nearby pub to where I lived at the time (with an American friend), and the bartender claimed that I had been in there the night before because he had served me. I still think he was pulling a fast one (as well as a pint) -but that aside, does anyone believe it?

Also, following Planet of the Apes, could life on other planets means that primates are intelligent and 'we' are a bit thick?

More pertinently, could there be a planet where to be Transexual is average, and its heterosexuals who are definitely weird?

I still think one populated planet is enough for the entire solar system, but maybe thats me showing my age!

[traLika]

When people read about this, are they assuming that, not only may there be another planet with human life -but that it is also identical to us? I don't know how many people on HA believe in doppelgangers, I know that in one place in the UK I used to see a young woman who was more or less identical to one I knew -in the same town- I was about to say hello when I realised she didn't recognise me. More freaky, when I lived in London I went into a nearby pub to where I lived at the time (with an American friend), and the bartender claimed that I had been in there the night before because he had served me. I still think he was pulling a fast one (as well as a pint) -but that aside, does anyone believe it?


Ha! I was about to say I don't believe in doppelgangers but then I suddenly remembered going for a pub lunch with a work colleague more than a decade ago and a couple I'd never seen before approached us outside the pub saying that I had played a fantastic gig the previous night at another pub that I had never been to before. I had to repeatedly say that whoever they saw the previous night it wasn't me but I could see that they didn't believe me. I have no idea who they thought I was but they seemed absolutely sure it was me. It freaked me out a little bit because I am a musician of sorts, just not a gigging one…


Also, following Planet of the Apes, could life on other planets means that primates are intelligent and 'we' are a bit thick?


I think life on different planets, if it exists, would be completely different on each planet, dependant on the planet's physics and chemistry, and events that shape its history (meteorite and comet bombardments, volcanic eruptions…). Primates might not even be the dominant species or, as you say, there could be some kinda super primate that makes us all look dumb…


More pertinently, could there be a planet where to be Transexual is average, and its heterosexuals who are definitely weird?



I remember Yvonne jokingly wondering if there were klingon trannies. Maybe she had a point!

[Stavros]

so, Mick, what was it about Keith's book that you really didn't like?

[traLika]

so, Mick, what was it about Keith's book that you really didn't like?


LOL! I'd swap my bank account for Mick's (or Keef's) any day!

I certainly can't get no satisfaction with mine...

[trish]

I wouldn't be surprised, though, if we (or future generations) discover that alien life might exist and even thrive without liquid water...

I agree. There may be media of “intelligence” and forms of “life” that utterly escape our contemporary imaginations. Unfortunately when looking for signs of life and intelligence we can only look for the expected signals and signs, keep our minds open and hope that we don’t miss the totally unexpected when it shows its face.

However many different kinds of life and intelligence are physically possible in our universe, I think its a safe bet we are not alone. However, we may be effectively alone. Unless our own solar system is hiding a civilization presently unknown to us, I doubt we’ll ever have a real time conversation with aliens. Unless we build them or grow them ourselves. Wormholes and stargates are not inconsistent general relativity, but we’d be awfully lucky to find one, let alone one that leads to another inhabited world.

But we can always keep our fingers crossed and our eyes open.

[muh_muh]

life like everything else in physics is lazy so its massively unlikely for life to form that isnt based around the same chemistry as ours:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMIyYwq_A8E&t=1m50s

[trish]

Nice clip. Thanks muh_muh. Basically I agree with Dr. Tyson, but just to play the devil's advocate I'll point out that the most ubiquitous matter in the universe is dark. Could there be dark-matter-based life? We know so little about dark matter we might be wise to withhold judgment on that question. But unfortunately what we do know about is not promising, namely it doesn't interact with anything except through its inertia (i.e. gravitational effects). So if there were dark-life-forms with interacting parts and interacting with the universe, they would have to be gargantuan walls stretching from one unseen corner of the universe to another. [Of course to send a signal from one end to the other would take longer than the age of the universe. So much for that theory]

[hippifried]

... tsk tsk tsk ...
You eggheads are always trying to convince us normals that there's something beyond our 3 senses. What's next? Gonna try & tell everybody that the earth is round again? Everybody knows it's a flat disk, held up by 5 giant elephants, who are standing on the back of an even bigger turtle.
... tsk tsk tsk ...

[Stavros]

You only have 3 senses, Hippifried? Your voyage of self-discovery has yet to begin, I feel...

[traLika]

life like everything else in physics is lazy so its massively unlikely for life to form that isnt based around the same chemistry as ours:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMIyYwq_A8E&t=1m50s


A very persuasive argument from Dr Tyson, muh_muh, but it still might also be possible for lifeforms to exist where there are liquid hydrocarbons instead of liquid water. Like on Saturn's moon Titan, which has a weather system based on methane (which also consists of two of the most abundant elements - carbon and hydrogen) in solid, liquid and gaseous forms.

[hippifried]

I have a photo sense. I have a chemical sense. Then I have a touch sense that allows me to discern heat, viscosity, & motion. Smell & taste are the same sense. Hearing is a touch sense, where you feel the vibrations in the surrounding medium.

[muh_muh]

namely it doesn't interact with anything except through its inertia (i.e. gravitational effects).

considering how little we know about dark matter other than (very) roughly how its distributed i dont think theres any reason why it shouldnt be perfectly viable that dark matter might be as diverse as normal or (considering the numbers involved) abnormal matter and perfectly capable of interacting with itself and existing in a sort of parallel universe within our universe

also i think youve just described a large part of geek culture which is arguably inhabited by people who are alive

other than that assuming dark matter is utterly boring the same logic applies to dark matter and helium


A very persuasive argument from Dr Tyson, muh_muh, but it still might also be possible for lifeforms to exist where there are liquid hydrocarbons instead of liquid water. Like on Saturn's moon Titan, which has a weather system based on methane (which also consists of two of the most abundant elements - carbon and hydrogen) in solid, liquid and gaseous forms.

good point
on the other hand the only chemistry that we have solid proof of being capable of spontaneously producing life based on those elements is ours so its probably not a bad choice to search for those primarily

btw another important aspect in searching for life is searching for planets with atmospheres that have illogically low levels of entropy
eg ours has a fairly large amount of oxygen in it which cannot possibly exist in an atmosphere without constant repruduction through something

[trish]

btw another important aspect in searching for life is searching for planets with atmospheres that have illogically low levels of entropyExcellent observation. If you aren't already familiar with it, you and the others here may be interested in Eric D. Schneider and Dorion Sagan's book, Into The Cool: Energy Flow, Thermodynamics and Life. I ran across it in a book store a few years ago and was enthralled by it.

[hippifried]

Are there pictures?