NASA announces 'major milestone' in search for Earth's twin

[News_Editor]

NASA announces 'major milestone' in search for Earth's twin

2011-12-07 04:51:32 GMT+7 (ICT)

PASADENA, CALIFORNIA (BNO NEWS) -- The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) on Monday announced that its planet-hunting Kepler spacecraft has discovered its first planet which is located in its host star's habitable zone.

NASA researchers also announced that Kepler, which was launched in March 2009 and was named after German astronomer Johannes Kepler who lived in the 17th century, has discovered more than 1,000 new planet candidates, nearly doubling its previously known count.

The planet Kepler-22b is the first confirmed planet found by Kepler which is located in the habitable zone, the region around a star where liquid water (and as a result, life) could exist on a planet's surface. The planet is about 2.4 times the radius of Earth but is the smallest yet found to orbit in the middle of the habitable zone of a star similar to our sun.

"This is a major milestone on the road to finding Earth's twin," said Douglas Hudgins, Kepler program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "Kepler's results continue to demonstrate the importance of NASA's science missions, which aim to answer some of the biggest questions about our place in the universe."

Kepler-22b is located 600 light-years away and its orbit of 290 days around a sun-like star resembles that of Earth. Although the planet's host star is slightly smaller and cooler than our sun, it belongs to the same class which is called a G-type.

Kepler discovers planets and planet candidates by measuring dips in the brightness of more than 150,000 stars to search for planets that cross in front, or "transit," the stars. Kepler requires at least three transits to verify a signal as a planet.

"Fortune smiled upon us with the detection of this planet," said William Borucki, Kepler principal investigator at NASA Ames Research Center at Moffett Field in California, who led the team that discovered Kepler-22b. "The first transit was captured just three days after we declared the spacecraft operationally ready. We witnessed the defining third transit over the 2010 holiday season."

Although Kepler has now identified a total of 2,326 planet candidates, only 10 of them are near-Earth-size and orbit in the habitable zone of their host star. Candidates require follow-up observations to verify they are actual planets.

-- © BNO News All rights reserved 2011-12-07

[Jingthing]

Time to start building the ships for the global warming escape of the species trip.

[Pedzie]

Time to start building the ships for the global warming escape of the species trip.

Not sure about escaping the global warming thing JT, we defo need another few planets in the future to sustain ourselves tho :-)

I wish NASA would finally make the announcement that we are not alone in the universe!

[wellred]

I just wish they woukd hurry up and make a commercial.hoverboard instead of wasting time and money scoping out a planet that we cant even get to.

[mca]

I just wish they woukd hurry up and make a commercial.hoverboard instead of wasting time and money scoping out a planet that we cant even get to.

+1

Or an implant that goes in your noggin so when you watch a porno flick it's as if you're actually taking part. Now that's progress!

Meanwhile on www.zargvisa.com/forum, an internet forum on earth's twin not dissimilar to one we all know.....

" I was in a fast-food joint and the moronic Zargian behind the counter didn't understand my request for a burger with no sauce. Why don't they understand Blargian? It's the most widely used language on the planet. All Zargians are idiots!"

" I met a girl who I really like and want to marry but her parents want 100 Gronks as a dowry. Is this excessive? BTW I am 300 years old and she's 12. "

[GentlemanJim]

Time to start building the ships for the global warming escape of the species trip.

Yea! Lets go destroy another one.

[Credo]

Why? We haven't finished ruining this one yet.

The big question is: Does it have oil?

[SAffer]

Do they have go-go bars?

[koheesti]

The planet is about 2.4 times the radius of Earth

So what does this tell us how life there might look? 2.5 times larger, stronger gravity so life forms there would need to be...what....stronger and bigger? That could be trouble. Maybe they've been looking for a planet to escape to because of their own Global Cooling?

[GentlemanJim]

The planet is about 2.4 times the radius of Earth

So what does this tell us how life there might look? 2.5 times larger, stronger gravity so life forms there would need to be...what....stronger and bigger? That could be trouble. Maybe they've been looking for a planet to escape to because of their own Global Cooling?

Not really. Looking at the oceans as an example, shorter and squatter is more likely or maybe walking halibuts or then again its about the size of Avatar!

[Scott]

Post with only quotes, but no reply has been deleted.

[Pedzie]

Makes you wonder what is out there in the universe tho...50 billion galaxies each containing 50 billion stars! if 0.01 of any planets orbiting any of these stars had life then that makes for a lot if life out there

[Scott]

One off-topic post has been removed. Please stay on-topic.