infinity-imagined: Exoplanets orbiting stars near the Sun. Hopefully no one takes this to mean that other stars, and their attendant planets, revolve around us, right? I mean, we’re cool, but we’re not THAT cool.Although the number of confirmed exoplanets is only in the hundreds, the number of estimated exoplanets could be as high as 100 billion (or more?), or one for every star in the Milky Way.And that doesn’t count the cold, presumably dead, rogue planets wandering interstellar space, forever alone.
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infinity-imagined:

Exoplanets orbiting stars near the Sun.

Hopefully no one takes this to mean that other stars, and their attendant planets, revolve around us, right? I mean, we’re cool, but we’re not THAT cool.

Although the number of confirmed exoplanets is only in the hundreds, the number of estimated exoplanets could be as high as 100 billion (or more?), or one for every star in the Milky Way.

And that doesn’t count the cold, presumably dead, rogue planets wandering interstellar space, forever alone.

The New York Times has created an interactive feature tallying all of the exoplanets discovered by NASA’s Kepler Telescope. You should really check out the link, because theirs is animated, and much bigger, and completely awesome.  This comes after news of Kepler’s detection of a new multiplanet system, with not one but two planets in the habitable zone (original research paper). Doesn’t mean that either of them would, could, or should have life, but put a check mark next to criteria #1 for biology. This brings us to a total of 871 confirmed exoplanets, which is a drop in a drop in a drop in the bucket for how many are estimated to be out there. Those 871 confirmed exoplanets represent a mere 0.0000008% of the likely number in just the Milky Way. Bonus: Find out more about how astrobiologists calculate the odds of extraterrestrial civilizations in this episode of It’s Okay To Be Smart: The Odds of Finding Life and Love.
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The New York Times has created an interactive feature tallying all of the exoplanets discovered by NASA’s Kepler Telescope. You should really check out the link, because theirs is animated, and much bigger, and completely awesome.  This comes after news of Kepler’s detection of a new multiplanet system, with not one but two planets in the habitable zone (original research paper). Doesn’t mean that either of them would, could, or should have life, but put a check mark next to criteria #1 for biology. This brings us to a total of 871 confirmed exoplanets, which is a drop in a drop in a drop in the bucket for how many are estimated to be out there. Those 871 confirmed exoplanets represent a mere 0.0000008% of the likely number in just the Milky Way. Bonus: Find out more about how astrobiologists calculate the odds of extraterrestrial civilizations in this episode of It’s Okay To Be Smart: The Odds of Finding Life and Love.
Zoom Info
The New York Times has created an interactive feature tallying all of the exoplanets discovered by NASA’s Kepler Telescope. You should really check out the link, because theirs is animated, and much bigger, and completely awesome.  This comes after news of Kepler’s detection of a new multiplanet system, with not one but two planets in the habitable zone (original research paper). Doesn’t mean that either of them would, could, or should have life, but put a check mark next to criteria #1 for biology. This brings us to a total of 871 confirmed exoplanets, which is a drop in a drop in a drop in the bucket for how many are estimated to be out there. Those 871 confirmed exoplanets represent a mere 0.0000008% of the likely number in just the Milky Way. Bonus: Find out more about how astrobiologists calculate the odds of extraterrestrial civilizations in this episode of It’s Okay To Be Smart: The Odds of Finding Life and Love.
Zoom Info

The New York Times has created an interactive feature tallying all of the exoplanets discovered by NASA’s Kepler Telescope. You should really check out the link, because theirs is animated, and much bigger, and completely awesome. 

This comes after news of Kepler’s detection of a new multiplanet system, with not one but two planets in the habitable zone (original research paper). Doesn’t mean that either of them would, could, or should have life, but put a check mark next to criteria #1 for biology.

This brings us to a total of 871 confirmed exoplanets, which is a drop in a drop in a drop in the bucket for how many are estimated to be out there. Those 871 confirmed exoplanets represent a mere 0.0000008% of the likely number in just the Milky Way.

Bonus: Find out more about how astrobiologists calculate the odds of extraterrestrial civilizations in this episode of It’s Okay To Be Smart: The Odds of Finding Life and Love.

Billions and Billions … of Planets There are infinite worlds both like and unlike this world of ours. For the atoms being infinite in number, as was already proven, (…) there nowhere exists an obstacle to the infinite number of worlds. - Epicurus (341-270 B.C.) Where is everybody? - Fermi’s Paradox, ca. 1950 In a universe of infinite possibilities, everything is not only possible, it’s probable. Of course, the universe isn’t really infinite. But in certain respects, it is big enough and contains so many of certain “things” that what is possible begins to get awfully close to what is probable. So it is with planets, and perhaps life outside of our solar system. But first, the news! NASA has announced its newest estimate for the number of planets in the Milky Way galaxy. Based on observations of a known system of extrasolar planets (those outside our own solar system), they determined there are at least 100 billion planets in our galaxy. At least. That means there is perhaps one planet for every star! That number doesn’t even take into account the existence of forever-alone rogue planets, wandering lifeless and free of warm parent stars. Which brings us back to Fermi’s Paradox. Lower estimates say there are ~2 x 1011  stars in the Milky Way (200 billion). If we do some more extrapolation and guesstimation, we can say there are roughly 7 x 1022 stars in the known universe … 70 thousand million million million stars. If most galaxies are like the Milky Way, then that means each star would have one planet, on average. Now let’s say that a tiny fraction of those are at the right distance from their stars and composed of the right stuff and subject to a host of other perfect conditions, and they may be capable of supporting life. That’s still a ridiculously huge number. So where is everyone?! It stands to reason, by odds and probability, that after 13.7 billion years of cosmic evolution we can’t be the sole special case in which that perfect storm of cosmic ingredients came together to produce life. That’s what bugged Fermi, and in a way, Epicurus before him. NASA’s Kepler project continues to identify and track extrasolar planets, accompanied by occasional announcements of Earthiness. Yet what we have discovered is a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of the planets in but our galaxy. the odds of any of them harboring life is immensely small, while the chance that life exists somewhere remains likely … to people like me, anyway.  To say that Earth is unique in the universe would be to say that one grain of sand on Earth (~1018 of them, by the way) is somehow more special than all the others. Of course, if we asked the grain of sand, it might say “Yes, I am special!” because it is the best grain of sand it knows of. So it is with us, waiting alone in the “biggitude” of it all, to find out if we’re special.
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Billions and Billions … of Planets

There are infinite worlds both like and unlike this world of ours. For the atoms being infinite in number, as was already proven, (…) there nowhere exists an obstacle to the infinite number of worlds. - Epicurus (341-270 B.C.)

Where is everybody? - Fermi’s Paradox, ca. 1950

In a universe of infinite possibilities, everything is not only possible, it’s probable. Of course, the universe isn’t really infinite. But in certain respects, it is big enough and contains so many of certain “things” that what is possible begins to get awfully close to what is probable.

So it is with planets, and perhaps life outside of our solar system.

But first, the news! NASA has announced its newest estimate for the number of planets in the Milky Way galaxy. Based on observations of a known system of extrasolar planets (those outside our own solar system), they determined there are at least 100 billion planets in our galaxy. At least. That means there is perhaps one planet for every star! That number doesn’t even take into account the existence of forever-alone rogue planets, wandering lifeless and free of warm parent stars.

Which brings us back to Fermi’s Paradox. Lower estimates say there are ~2 x 1011  stars in the Milky Way (200 billion). If we do some more extrapolation and guesstimation, we can say there are roughly 7 x 1022 stars in the known universe … 70 thousand million million million stars. If most galaxies are like the Milky Way, then that means each star would have one planet, on average. Now let’s say that a tiny fraction of those are at the right distance from their stars and composed of the right stuff and subject to a host of other perfect conditions, and they may be capable of supporting life. That’s still a ridiculously huge number.

So where is everyone?! It stands to reason, by odds and probability, that after 13.7 billion years of cosmic evolution we can’t be the sole special case in which that perfect storm of cosmic ingredients came together to produce life. That’s what bugged Fermi, and in a way, Epicurus before him.

NASA’s Kepler project continues to identify and track extrasolar planets, accompanied by occasional announcements of Earthiness. Yet what we have discovered is a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of the planets in but our galaxy. the odds of any of them harboring life is immensely small, while the chance that life exists somewhere remains likely … to people like me, anyway. 

To say that Earth is unique in the universe would be to say that one grain of sand on Earth (~1018 of them, by the way) is somehow more special than all the others. Of course, if we asked the grain of sand, it might say “Yes, I am special!” because it is the best grain of sand it knows of. So it is with us, waiting alone in the “biggitude” of it all, to find out if we’re special.

Source: jpl.nasa.gov

Catalog of Habitable Planets The idea of what makes a planet “habitable” is one of temperature, distance from its parent star, composition, etc. It’s not really one of utility, i.e. “actually being able to go live there”.  The search for exoplanets via NASA’s Kepler project and others has perhaps not discovered life-rich alien worlds (the equipment they use couldn’t do that if they tried), but it has reinforced the idea that there are a TON of planets out there. Planets, like or unlike our own, are very common. The Planetary Habitability Laboratory at Puerto Rico’s Aricebo observatory (the big crater telescope from Contact) put together this catalog of potentially habitable known exoplanets ranked by their “Earth Similarity”. Visit the link for a load more details. As our techniques and equipment advance, this list will surely grow by leaps and bounds. It doesn’t mean that any of them will harbor extraterrestrial life, but it reminds us that while the scientific characteristics of our home might not be uncommon, the ability for one species on Earth to search for others like it surely is something special.
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Catalog of Habitable Planets

The idea of what makes a planet “habitable” is one of temperature, distance from its parent star, composition, etc. It’s not really one of utility, i.e. “actually being able to go live there”. 

The search for exoplanets via NASA’s Kepler project and others has perhaps not discovered life-rich alien worlds (the equipment they use couldn’t do that if they tried), but it has reinforced the idea that there are a TON of planets out there. Planets, like or unlike our own, are very common.

The Planetary Habitability Laboratory at Puerto Rico’s Aricebo observatory (the big crater telescope from Contact) put together this catalog of potentially habitable known exoplanets ranked by their “Earth Similarity”. Visit the link for a load more details.

As our techniques and equipment advance, this list will surely grow by leaps and bounds. It doesn’t mean that any of them will harbor extraterrestrial life, but it reminds us that while the scientific characteristics of our home might not be uncommon, the ability for one species on Earth to search for others like it surely is something special.

Source: phl.upr.edu

A Needle in Countless Haystacks

In a universe of billions of galaxies filled with billions of stars, how do we go about finding habitable planets?  It seems like barely a  week goes by before another frustratingly uninformative headline pops up saying something like “Earth-like planet orbiting distant star?”

Earth is the only living planet that we know of, so we use it as a model for the rest of the universe. Here’s how astronomers do it, thanks to TED Ed.

Source: youtube.com

Worlds

Have you ever wondered what all 2,299 candidate exoplanets found by the Kepler survey as of February 2012 would look like if they orbited the same star and were scaled by size and temperature?

Thanks to Alex Parker, you shall wonder no more. Check out more about how the Kepler planet-hunting survey works and the planetary catalog you see here at Scientific American.

Source: vimeo.com

Alpha Centauri, Neighboring “Earths” and the New Astronomy Our nearest neighboring star system has been found to harbor an Earth-sized planet, that although uninhabitable, may inspire a new era of planetary study. Alpha Centauri is a system of two stars, A and B, only 4.3 light years from Earth (a mere 25 trillion miles). It can be seen easily by telescopes, as seen above over the rings of Saturn as captured by the Cassini orbiter. It is also visible by the naked eye, being the third brightest object in the sky, part of the southern constellation Centaurus. European astronomers have identified an Earth-sized planet orbiting one of the two stars, and named it Alpha Centauri B b. It takes a trip around its star every three days, and has surface temperatures above 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Since we are such close neighbors, we share nearly the same perspective on the arrangement of stars throughout the universe. If could you stand on the surface of this planet without incinerating, the night sky would look very much like it does from Earth. Our own Sun would reside in that night sky, at the bottom left of the constellation Cassiopeia. Although this planet could almost certainly not harbor life, and we have not observed it directly, it makes it almost obvious that planets exist everywhere, and among those a great many should possess both Earth-like and completely novel compositions. I mean, just look at how many we’ve confirmed so far! I am moved by Lee Billings’ wonderful piece at Centauri Dreams, in which he wonders if this discovery will shift astronomical focus away from the beginning of the universe and studying its most distant expanses, and instead call for us to turn our focus to charting the many worlds that surround our own. Go check it out. More at Galileo’s Pendulum as well.
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Alpha Centauri, Neighboring “Earths” and the New Astronomy

Our nearest neighboring star system has been found to harbor an Earth-sized planet, that although uninhabitable, may inspire a new era of planetary study.

Alpha Centauri is a system of two stars, A and B, only 4.3 light years from Earth (a mere 25 trillion miles). It can be seen easily by telescopes, as seen above over the rings of Saturn as captured by the Cassini orbiter. It is also visible by the naked eye, being the third brightest object in the sky, part of the southern constellation Centaurus. European astronomers have identified an Earth-sized planet orbiting one of the two stars, and named it Alpha Centauri B b. It takes a trip around its star every three days, and has surface temperatures above 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit.

Since we are such close neighbors, we share nearly the same perspective on the arrangement of stars throughout the universe. If could you stand on the surface of this planet without incinerating, the night sky would look very much like it does from Earth. Our own Sun would reside in that night sky, at the bottom left of the constellation Cassiopeia.

Although this planet could almost certainly not harbor life, and we have not observed it directly, it makes it almost obvious that planets exist everywhere, and among those a great many should possess both Earth-like and completely novel compositions. I mean, just look at how many we’ve confirmed so far!

I am moved by Lee Billings’ wonderful piece at Centauri Dreams, in which he wonders if this discovery will shift astronomical focus away from the beginning of the universe and studying its most distant expanses, and instead call for us to turn our focus to charting the many worlds that surround our own. Go check it out.

More at Galileo’s Pendulum as well.

Source: centauri-dreams.org

Remember the cool xkcd infographicomic with all the known and verified exoplanets drawn to scale? If not, refresh your memory here. Well now you can play with an interactive version of that comic! It looks just like the image above, but you have to click here to actually play with it, because the internet is not made of magic. (this fine coding work done by Lane Harrison) EDIT: When you click through to the viz, highlight the whole image and get a special nerd surprise. Sharp eyes by follower orangeschmorange!) EDIT 2: Also try the Konami code (up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, b, a, enter) #mindblown
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Remember the cool xkcd infographicomic with all the known and verified exoplanets drawn to scale? If not, refresh your memory here.

Well now you can play with an interactive version of that comic! It looks just like the image above, but you have to click here to actually play with it, because the internet is not made of magic.

(this fine coding work done by Lane Harrison)

EDIT: When you click through to the viz, highlight the whole image and get a special nerd surprise. Sharp eyes by follower orangeschmorange!)

EDIT 2: Also try the Konami code (up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, b, a, enter) #mindblown

Exoplanets, all that we have verified. And if you don’t feel like clicking on the link and viewing the mouse-over text, a little extrapolation says that just the likely planets in our one galaxy would require a chart three to four orders of magnitude larger. So yeah, there’s a lot of planets out there. Let’s ensure we have the best tools to study them, shall we? (via xkcd)
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Exoplanets, all that we have verified. And if you don’t feel like clicking on the link and viewing the mouse-over text, a little extrapolation says that just the likely planets in our one galaxy would require a chart three to four orders of magnitude larger. So yeah, there’s a lot of planets out there.

Let’s ensure we have the best tools to study them, shall we?

(via xkcd)

Source: xkcd.com

Kepler’s Latest: 1,091 New Kepler Planet Candidates

The Kepler mission has dumped its latest batch of exoplanet candidates on the pile this week. This recent addition brings the total number of exoplanet candidates (planet-like objects transiting a distant star) to 2,321!

The video above is a visualization of all those planetary systems with more than one member, like our own solar system, with sizes and orbits to scale. One even has six planets!!

These are all currently just candidates, but with continued support for this project we can continue to seek out the answer to that question on everyone’s mind: How many could support life, and in what ways? Too early to tell, unfortunately.

Here’s some stats on the Kepler list so far:

  • There are now 246 Earth-sized planet candidates.
  • There are 1,118 Neptune-sized candidates, but big planets are easier to find with Kepler.
  • Forty-six of these are in the “habitable zone”, 10 of which are Earth-sized.
  • There was a 123% increase in planets with orbits longer than 50 days.

The search continues!

(via NASA and Universe Today)

Source: kepler.nasa.gov