Water worlds, especially if they have no land on them, are unlikely to be home to life, or at least life we can detect. Some of the basic atmospheric and mineral cycles that make a planet habitable will be absent. Cool animation of such a world. (NASA) Wherever we find water on Earth, we find …
Can You Overwater a Planet?
https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/system/video_items/107_WaterWorldHiH264.mp4 Water worlds, especially if they have no land on them, are unlikely to be home to life, or at least lifewe can detect. Some of the basic atmospheric and mineral cycles that make a planet habitable will be absent. Cool animation of such a world. (NASA) By guest columnist Elizabeth Tasker Wherever we …
Getting Real About the Oxygen Biosignature
I remember the first time I heard about the atmospheres of distant exoplanets and how could and would let us know whether life was present below. The key was oxygen or its light-modified form, ozone. Because both oxygen and ozone molecules bond so quickly with other molecules -- think rust or iron oxide on …
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The Very Influential Natalie Batalha
I'd like to make a slight detour and talk not about the science of exoplanets and astrobiology, but rather a particular exoplanet scientist who I've had the pleasure to work with. The scientist is Natalie Batalha, who has been lead scientist for NASA's landmark Kepler Space Telescope mission since soon after it launched in 2009, …
The Very Influential Natalie Batalha
I'd like to make a slight detour and talk not about the science of exoplanets and astrobiology, but rather a particular exoplanet scientist who I've had the pleasure to work with. The scientist is Natalie Batalha, who has been lead scientist for NASA's landmark Kepler Space Telescope mission since soon after it launched in 2009, …
Ocean Worlds: Enceladus Looks Increasingly Habitable, and Europa’s Ocean Under the Ice More Accessible to Sample
It wasn't that long ago that Enceladus, one of 53 moons of Saturn, was viewed as a kind of ho-hum object of no great importance. It was clearly frozen and situated in a magnetic field maelstrom caused by the giant planet nearby and those saturnine rings. That view was significantly modified in 2005 when scientists …
A Four Planet System in Orbit, Directly Imaged and Remarkable
Now on Facebook: http://facebook.com/nexssmanyworlds/ The era of directly imaging exoplanets has only just begun, but the science and viewing pleasures to come are appealingly apparent. This evocative movie of four planets more massive than Jupiter orbiting the young star HR 8799 is a composite of sorts, including images taken over seven years at the W.M. …
Continue reading "A Four Planet System in Orbit, Directly Imaged and Remarkable"
A Four Planet System in Orbit, Directly Imaged and Remarkable
Now on Facebook: http://facebook.com/nexssmanyworlds/ The era of directly imaging exoplanets has only just begun, but the science and viewing pleasures to come are appealingly apparent. This evocative movie of four planets more massive than Jupiter orbiting the young star HR 8799 is a composite of sorts, including images taken over seven years at the W.M. …
Continue reading "A Four Planet System in Orbit, Directly Imaged and Remarkable"
The Stellar Side of The Exoplanet Story
When it comes to the study of exoplanets, it's common knowledge that the host stars don't get much respect. Yes, everyone knows that there wouldn't be exoplanets without stars, and that they serve as the essential background for exoplanet transit observations and as the wobbling object that allows for radial velocity measurements that lead …
One Planet, But Many Different Earths
We all know that life has not been found so far on any planet beyond Earth -- at least not yet. This lack of discovery of extraterrestrial life has long been used as a knock on the field of astrobiology and has sometimes been put forward as a measure of Earth's uniqueness. But the more …
Many Worlds 