Datasets:
| <html> | |
| <body> | |
| <p><strong>Discovering Habitable Worlds Elsewhere</strong></p> | |
| <p>Alan P. Boss</p> | |
| <p><em>Department of Terrestrial Magnetism</em></p> | |
| <p><em>Carnegie Institution </em></p> | |
| <p><em>5241 Broad Branch Road, N.W.</em></p> | |
| <p><em>Washington, DC 20015-1305 USA</em></p> | |
| <p>HYPERLINK "mailto:boss@dtm.ciw.edu" boss@dtm.ciw.edu </p> | |
| <p>Perhaps the most important astronomical contribution to the new science of Astrobiology is the discovery and characterization of potentially inhabited planets outside of our Solar System. Ground-based spectroscopic planet search efforts have discovered roughly 150 extrasolar gas giant planets, and may have uncovered the first examples of rocky planets similar to the Earth, though on uninhabitable, short-period orbits. NASA embarked on a long-term search for Earth-like planets orbiting other stars well before this goal was enunciated in the President’s Vision for Space Exploration. NASA’s Kepler Mission will determine the frequency of habitable worlds by photometric monitoring of ~100,000 stars in the constellation Cygnus for four years, long enough to detect three or four transits of Earth-size planets on habitable orbits in front of their host stars. The Space Interferometry Mission will be able to detect habitable planets with masses as low as about 3 Earth masses orbiting around stars in the solar neighborhood by measuring the astrometric wobble of the host stars to exquisite precision. The Terrestrial Planet Finders will directly image nearby Earths in the optical and infrared, using coronagraphic and interferometric techniques, respectively, allowing the spectral characterization of their atmospheres and surfaces. Single and binary stars will be searched, as well as a range of stellar types, in order to arrive at the first census of habitable planets in our neighborhood of the galaxy.</p> | |
| </body> | |
| </html> | |