A team of scientists, including Carnegie’s Alan Boss, has discovered two Earth-like planets in the habitable orbit of a Sun-like star. Their work is published in Science Express. Using observations […]
exoplanet
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets, Press Release
Kepler-62 Has Two Water Worlds Circling in its Habitable Zone
In our solar system, only one planet is blessed with an ocean: Earth. Our home world is a rare, blue jewel compared to the deserts of Mercury, Venus and Mars. […]
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets
Planets in Kepler-37 Star System Designated 'UGA-1785' by NASA
The nation’s first state-chartered university recently became the world’s first to have a star system named after it. The University of Georgia and its Franklin College of Arts and Sciences […]
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones
Towards the Minimum Inner Edge Distance of the Habitable Zone
We explore the minimum distance from a host star for an exoplanet to be potentially habitable, in order to maximize future chances of finding other habitable worlds. We find that […]
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets
NASA Hosts Media Briefing to Discuss Kepler Planetary Discovery
NASA will host a news briefing at 2 p.m. EDT, Thursday, April 18, to announce new discoveries from the agency’s Kepler mission. The briefing will be held in the Syvertson […]
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones
The Great Exoplanet Debate: Concepts of Habitability
In part two of The Great Exoplanet Debate, the panel of experts discuss current concepts of habitability and how these concepts are changing as our knowledge of life’s potential grows. […]
Posted inAstronomy & Telescopes, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Status Report
Where to Find Habitable "Earths" in Circumbinary Systems
Hitherto, six P-type planets are found around five binary systems, i.e. Kepler-16 b, 34 b, 35 b, 38 b, 47 b, c, which are all Neptune or Jupiter-like planets. The […]
Posted inAstronomy & Telescopes, Citizen Science / Open Science, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Press Release
Traffic Jam of Moons in Habitable Zones
Volunteers from the Planethunters.org website, part of the Oxford University-led Zooniverse project, have discovered 15 new planet candidates orbiting in the habitable zones of other stars.
Posted inAlpha Centauri, Education and Outreach, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Science Fiction, Societal Issues
Avatar: A Stunning New World That NASA Is Ignoring
Editor’s note: “Avatar“, a film by former NASA Advisory Committee member James Cameron, will debut across the planet on 18 December. Widely hailed as “ground breaking” the film may well […]
![An artist’s depiction of our world when the Earthshine measurements were taken, enhanced to show the “red edge” from vegetation. A distant astronomer on another planet would see the spectral signatures of our oxygen atmosphere, water, and chlorophyll from land plants. [enlarge] Credit: John Walker’s “Earth Viewer,” Christine Lafon, (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics).](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2002/10/Astronomers-Find-Life-on-Earth.png?resize=1200%2C719&ssl=1)
Posted inAtmospheres, Climate, Weather, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Press Release, Water/Hycean Worlds & Oceanography
Astronomers Find Life On Earth
Now that the discovery of extrasolar planets, or planets around distant stars, has become relatively routine, scientists are now tackling the next step: finding life-bearing worlds. To do this, observers […]