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The Search for a New Earth

Jared Rinaldi

The search for intelligent life marches on with Nasa recently launching its groundbreaking new Kepler Telescope from Cape Canaveral this past March.

The Kepler telescope was designed to find extrasolar planets with characteristics similar to Earth's, including size, distance from their sun, and duration of their orbit. Essentially, NASA is not only looking to see if we're alone in the universe, but also whether or not there are planets we can potentially migrate to in the future.

While most deep-space telescopes use Doppler-shift technology to detect stars (where stars tremble slightly due to the gravitational pull of planets), Kepler uses optic-technology to observe the dimming of a star, which occurs when a planet comes between it and Kepler's line of sight. This will make Kepler more useful in detecting smaller, more hospitable planets, which up to now have been almost impossible to find.

Though more than 300 exoplanets have been found, almost none contain the necessary characteristics to harbor life. Scientists are hoping that this will change with Kepler.

 

Creative Commons Image: "Leave It To Me To Find This Image on Nasa Files." by Helder.

 

Comments

Stake Your Claim

Submitted by Pippalayana on Fri, 08/07/2009 - 16:19.

I guess life on Earth was just a practise run ... an experiment gone bad

... oh well just go 'a planet hopping

oh no

Submitted by Joan of Art on Fri, 08/07/2009 - 18:39.
The human race needs to solve what it f**ked up here before it goes migrating to other new planets that it can rape and plunder.

PKepler Search for Intelligence

Submitted by Thom Kennet on Fri, 08/07/2009 - 19:00.

We could migrate back to the old Earth I suppose. It seems to be quite close, IIRC.

 

But that would require much more complex kit than rocket ships and telescopes - it would require a biological mutation of our digital brain. And that seems to be unlikely at this point .

 

Then again, the mutant always seems to be unlikely, until it shakes your hand, reads your mind, and silently says, "there have been some changes."

 

 

In wildness is the preservation of the world - Thoreau

Before and Again

Submitted by Yem36313 on Wed, 08/12/2009 - 14:33.

AS they say in Battlestar Galactica, "All of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again." The nature of life itself is cyclical. If we can assume it applies to our own cycle, it must also apply to the greater universe. The hunger for exploration of new "earths" is certainly not a new concept.

 I certainly think that there are many planets that resemble ours--with or without human life on them. I am also certain that in the distant future, we'll make our way there and beyond, however, it my firm belief that once we begin exploring those world's it will right back to the simple concept of "there is no place like home" and there simply isn't.

It's an exciting prospect though...