… From Gliese 581 Astronomers have completed the first search for extraterrestrial intelligence on nearby exoplanets using very long baseline interferometry A telescope’s angular resolution is its ability to distinguish small details of a distant object. The Hubble Space telescope, for example, has an angular resolution of about 100 milliarcseconds. That’s good but by no… [Read more…]
April 29, 2012
… built more on optimism than evidence, study finds Recent discoveries of planets similar to Earth in size and proximity to the planets’ respective suns have sparked scientific and public excitement about the possibility of also finding Earth-like life on those worlds. But Princeton University researchers have found that the expectation that life — from bacteria to… [Read more…]
March 25, 2012
Juan Carlos Garcia-Escartin, Pedro Chamorro-Posada Advanced civilizations capable of interstellar travel, if they exist, are likely to have advanced propulsion methods. Spaceships moving at high speeds would leave a particular signature which could be detected from Earth. We propose a search based on the properties of light reflecting from objects travelling at relativistic speeds. Based… [Read more…]
February 29, 2012
A website has been launched that aims to get the public involved in the search for extraterrestrial life. Announced at the TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) conference in Los Angeles, the site will stream radio frequencies that are transmitted from the Seti (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Allen Telescope Array. Participants will be asked to search… [Read more…]
February 12, 2012
by Jill Tarter - newscientist Earth 2.0 is in our sights. Checking it for signs of life will be the next big issue THE thousands of probable worlds discovered in orbit around other stars are making our corner of the universe appear a lot friendlier to life these days. The Kepler space telescope, which has its… [Read more…]
December 27, 2011
… around a Super Massive Black Hole Makoto Inoue, Hiromitsu Yokoo We describe a new system for a society of highly advanced civilizations around a super massive black hole (SMBH), as an advanced Type III “Dyson Sphere“, pointing out an efficient usage of energy for the advanced civilizations. SMBH also works as a sink for… [Read more…]
December 3, 2011
Philosophy and problems of the definition of Extraterrestrial Life Jean Schneider Abstract When we try to search for extraterrestrial life and intelligence, we have to follow some guidelines. The first step is to clarify what is to be meant by “Life” and “intelligence”, i.e. an attempt to define these words. The word “definition” refers to… [Read more…]
November 29, 2011
Light on Mars? Curiosity rover to fire ‘million bulb torch’ at planet’s surface to see if it’s habitable The Mars lander will fire a laser beam with the energy of a million lightbulbs at the surface of the red planet to see whether or not it could have supported life. The international team of space… [Read more…]
November 24, 2011
A Two-Tiered Approach to Assessing the Habitability of Exoplanets EARTH SIMILARITY INDEX Earth – 1.00 Gliese 581g – 0.89 Gliese 581d – 0.74 Gliese 581c – 0.70 Mars – 0.70 Mercury – 0.60 HD 69830 d – 0.60 55 Cnc c – 0.56 Moon – 0.56 Gliese 581e – 0.53 PLANET HABITABILITY INDEX Titan –… [Read more…]
November 8, 2011
Administration response to website petition denies knowledge of life outside Earth is being hidden from public The White House has said it has no evidence that extraterrestrial creatures exist. Barack Obama’s administration made the declaration on Monday in response to feedback on its website, which allows people to submit petitions to which officials must respond if enough… [Read more…]
October 6, 2011
NASA’s Kepler space telescope is finding lots and lots of extrasolar planets. But how many might support intelligent life? And, is there a “sweet spot” in the galaxy where SETI astronomers should aim their telescopes? I’d say we have already stumbled across that sweet spot three decades ago, but more on that later. SLIDE SHOW: Top 10… [Read more…]
October 3, 2011
World’s largest eye on the sky to join quest for signs of ET The device will be built in the Chilean desert in a dome the size of a stadium Housed in a dome almost the size of Big Ben and containing a mirror nearly half the length of a football pitch, it wasn’t exactly… [Read more…]
September 26, 2011
The Fermi paradox is the apparent contradiction between high estimates of the probability of the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations and the lack of evidence for, or contact with, such civilizations. As Enrico Fermi asked if the Universe is conducive to intelligent life, “Where is everybody? A new answer proposed by Adrian Kent of the University… [Read more…]
September 23, 2011
Summary: Although stars closer to the galactic center are exposed to more radiation, new research finds that there are more chances to find habitable planets there than in the outer regions of our galaxy We know for certain that life exists in the Milky Way galaxy: that life is us. Scientists are continually looking to understand… [Read more…]
September 17, 2011
Introduction During a lunch in the summer of 1950, physicists Enrico Fermi, Edward Teller and Herbert York were chatting about a recent New Yorker cartoon depicting aliens abducting trash cans in flying saucers. Suddenly, Fermi suddenly blurted out, “Where is everybody?” Behind Fermi’s question was this line of reasoning: Since there are likely many other technological civilizations… [Read more…]
July 28, 2011
Any sulfurous molecules that astronomers spot on alien worlds might be a way to reveal whether or not those distant planets host life, researchers suggest. On Earth, microbes can live off the energy available in sulfurous molecules that volcanoes release, essentially “breathing” these compounds the way humans breathe oxygen. If a similar kind of metabolism… [Read more…]
June 17, 2011
Before discussing the conclusions of this paper released this week, I’ll start with a pub-quiz style question. How much of Earth’s atmosphere has not been made by living things? The answer is: less than 1%, which is mostly argon. The overwhelming majority is biogenic; the nitrogen is a product of denitrifying bacteria, the oxygen from plants,… [Read more…]
June 6, 2011
“Not only is phosphorus the active component of ATP, it also forms the backbone of DNA and is important in the structure of cell walls. But despite its importance to life, it is not fully understood how phosphorus first appeared in our atmosphere. One theory is that it was contained within the many meteorites that… [Read more…]
June 5, 2011
After 40 years of missions to Mars, its secrets could finally be within our reach Forty years ago, space engineers launched a probe that would play a pivotal role in changing our understanding of our place in the cosmos. On 30 May 1971, Mariner 9 was dispatched to Mars on an Atlas Centaur rocket and… [Read more…]
June 2, 2011
“It’s like finding Moby Dick in Lake Ontario,” says Tullis Onstott of the nematode worms his Princeton University team discovered living far beneath the Earth’s surface in South Africa. The tiny worms – just 500 micrometres long – were found at depths ranging from 900 metres to 3.6 kilometres, in three gold mines in the Witwatersrand basin… [Read more…]
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May 31, 2012
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