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Category: alien life – Page 14

How can the metal content of stars influence the formation of Earth-like exoplanets? This is what a recent study published in The Astronomical Journal hopes to address as an international team of researchers investigated the minimum amount of metals a star can possess (also called metallicity) that are needed for Earth-like planets to form in small orbits like our own. This study holds the potential to help researchers better understand the necessary conditions for Earth-like exoplanets to form, along with gaining new insights into the formation and evolution of other exoplanets.

This research builds off previous studies that hypothesized a correlation between star’s low metallicity and the formation of exoplanets smaller than Saturn or Neptune. For this new study, the researchers used computer models built from exoplanet data obtained by NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) mission to ascertain a metallicity cutoff where the formation of Earth-like exoplanets become impossible. In the end, the researchers indicated that a threshold between-0.75 and-0.5 metallicity is where Earth-like exoplanets can form.

“In a similar stellar type as our sample, we now know not to expect planet formation to be abundant once you pass a negative 0.5 metallicity region,” said Dr. Kiersten Boley, who recently completed her PhD at The Ohio State University and is lead author of the study. “That’s kind of striking because we actually have data to show that now. You don’t want to search areas where life wouldn’t be conducive or in areas where you don’t even think you’re going to find a planet. There’s just a plethora of questions that you can ask if you know these things.”

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Imagine aliens finding the golden record only to search earth and find a floating sign in space saying “301 moved permanently”.

TL;DR

The concept of a stellar engine, as discussed on Kurzgesagt’s YouTube channel, proposes using thrusters to move our entire solar system. The Shkadov Thruster, a passive solar sail system, would harness the Sun’s energy to propel the system, but it would be extremely slow, potentially moving 100 light-years in 230 million years. To increase speed, astrophysicist Matthew Caplan designed an active engine using the Bussard ramjet concept, known as the Caplan Thruster, which could move the solar system 50 light-years in a million years. This engine uses the Sun’s materials for fusion propulsion, generating thrust to push the Sun.

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“For the most part, we think of the deep sea as a place where decaying material falls down and animals eat the remnants. But this finding is recalibrating that dynamic,” said Dr. Jeffrey Marlow.

What can deep ocean life teach us about finding life on other worlds? This is what a recent study published in Nature Geoscience hopes to address as an international team of researchers investigated how “dark oxygen” —which is oxygen produced without sunlight—is produced by deep sea creatures that reside within the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ) which is approximately 12,000 to 18,000 feet beneath the ocean’s surface and completely dark. This study holds the potential to help researchers better understand the conditions for life and where else we might find these conditions on worlds outside Earth.

For the study, the researchers used deep-sea chambers on the seafloor to measure changes in oxygen levels, which the team initially hypothesized was caused by the microbial life and other creatures living between the rocks, the latter of which are millions of years old. Along with thinking the local life produced the oxygen, the team also hypothesized the life consumed it, as well, resulting decreased oxygen levels. However, after 48 hours of collecting data, the researchers the oxygen levels increased, indicating that something else was producing oxygen at these extreme depths so far from the Sun.

The researchers found that these million-year-old rocks, called polymetallic nodules, were responsible for producing the oxygen, which the team has since dubbed dark oxygen since these ocean depths are so far down that no sunlight can reach it. With these incredible findings, the researchers postulate that dark oxygen could help explain why and how life can survive at such extreme depths, and potentially help astrobiologists find life on other world, including Jupiter’s moon, Europa, and Saturn’s moon, Enceladus.

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What were galaxies like in the early universe? This is what a recent study published in The Astronomical Journal hopes to address as an international team of researchers investigated the formation and evolution of galaxies in the early universe, as recent studies have suggested they were much larger than cosmology models had simulated. This study holds the potential to help researchers better understand the conditions in the early universe and how life came to be.

“We are still seeing more galaxies than predicted, although none of them are so massive that they ‘break’ the universe,” said Katherine Chworowsky, who is a PhD student at the University of Texas at Austin and lead author of the study.

For the study, the researchers used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to peer deep into the universe’s past and observe some of the earliest galaxies to ascertain their sizes and whether they are as massive as recent studies have suggested. After analyzing the data, the researchers discovered that black holes residing at the center of these galaxies are creating false brightness and sizes, meaning these galaxies are much smaller than previously thought, thus reducing the panic within the scientific community regarding cosmological models. However, this study does suggest further research is necessary regarding star formation and evolution within these galaxies.

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A groundbreaking study has revealed that red dwarf stars can produce stellar flares that carry far-ultraviolet (far-UV) radiation levels much higher than previously believed. This discovery suggests that the intense UV radiation from these flares could significantly impact whether planets around red dwarf stars can be habitable. Led by current and former astronomers from the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy (IfA), the research was recently published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

“Few stars have been thought to generate enough UV radiation through flares to impact planet habitability. Our findings show that many more stars may have this capability,” said astronomer Vera Berger, who undertook the study while in the Research Experiences for Undergraduates program at IfA, an initiative supported by the National Science Foundation.

Berger and her team used archival data from the GALEX space telescope to search for flares among 300,000 nearby stars. GALEX is a now-decommissioned NASA mission that simultaneously observed most of the sky at near-and far-UV wavelengths from 2003 to 2013. Using new computational techniques, the team mined novel insights from the data.

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Planetary Science Innovation For All Humanity — Professor Dr. Dan Blumberg Ph.D. — Vice-President for Regional and Industrial Development — Ben-Gurion University of the Negev — Chair, Israel Space Agency.

Professor Dr. Dan Blumberg, Ph.D. is the Vice-President for Regional and Industrial Development at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU — https://www.blumberg.bgu.ac.il/), an elected Member of the International Academy of Astronautics, and Chair of the Israel Space Agency (https://www.space.gov.il/en), a position he was appointed to by the Ministry of Innovation, Science and Technology (https://www.gov.il/en/departments/min…) in 2022.

Prior to these positions, Prof. Blumberg completed five years as Vice President and Dean for Research and Development at BGU and before that he fulfilled several positions including Deputy Vice President, Chairperson of the Department of Geography and Environmental Development and the founder of the Green Campus initiative at BGU which gained the University an international ranking of #18.

Prof. Blumberg earned a Ph.D. from Arizona State University (1993) where he studied and worked in the Planetary Geology Group and focused on aeolian processes and microwave radar remote sensing to study arid zone environments and planetary geology. He was a Co-Investigator on the SRL (Spaceborne Radar Laboratory) mission, SRTM (Spaceborne Radar Topography) mission and other space missions.

Prof. Blumberg has been working for the past 20 years on analysis of multi-parameter remote sensing data including radar, hyperspectral, multi-spectral and ground penetrating radar data. He has also published numerous papers in the areas of target and anomaly detection and combined field studies with the use of remote sensing data. He also led the development and successful launch on February 15, 2017 of a Nanosatellite, BGUsat.

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Related: These nearby star systems could be good targets in the search for alien life (video)

“Both TOI-1408 b and TOI-1408 c are incredibly close to their parent star compared to the planets in our solar system,” research lead author Judith Korth of Lund University told Space.com. “Imagine our solar system, but instead, Jupiter is orbiting very close to the sun nearly every four days, one-twentieth of the period of Mercury.

This is already very close to the star, and still, we detected another planet even closer to the star that interacts strongly with its big neighbor, causing their orbits to wobble in ways we’ve never seen before.

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