Tag: Exoplanets

Lord I’m 400 Years From My Home

Posted on by Dilip D'Souza

by Dilip D’Souza

Apha, Beta, and Proxima Centauri

The star Proxima Centauri has been in the news this August. One reason is actually as a sort of corollary, a side mention. Proxima Centauri, Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B are the stars that make up the star system we know as Alpha Centauri: a triple star system, though without a telescope, we see it as one star.

Now such a system is fascinating enough by itself, but the real reason Alpha Centauri interests us Earth folks is that it is the closest “star” to us apart from our Sun – about 4.5 light years away. And of the three, Proxima Centauri is actually the closest. And, as a red dwarf, it’s the smallest, the coolest, the … in fact, deadest of the three. That’s because red dwarf stars are close to the end of their lives.

This August, a team of astronomers used the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to discover a planet orbiting Alpha Centauri A. Not only that, it looks like the planet is in Alpha Centauri A’s “habitable zone”, meaning it’s at least possible there might be life there. (I wrote about that discovery here.)

Why is the Alpha Centauri A planet a reminder of Proxima Centauri? Because while this planet is new to us, we’ve known for a few years now that three planets orbit Proxima. Which means that of the nearly six thousand so-called “exoplanets” – planets outside our Solar System – we know of today, these three are the closest to us. What’s more, one of them is in Proxima’s habitable zone. (That particular exoplanet prompted this column, but it returns only near the end.)

It should be no surprise that there are scientists who put those facts together and think: Can we humans get there? Can we live there? Read more »

Monday, February 17, 2020

Looking Up with 2020 Vision: Astronomers’ Views of our Night Sky

Posted on by Carol A Westbrook

by Carol A Westbrook

Looking up at the night sky

Have you ever looked up at a dark night sky filled with millions of stars, and felt the wonder and awe of the universe? It’s a rare experience in 2020, since the night sky is so bright due to light pollution, that even the brightest stars appear dim. Fortunately, don’t need a dark sky to appreciate the wonder of the heavens; you only have to have a look at what today’s astronomers can see.

Astronomers now use telescopes that view with more wavelengths than the human eye can see, and process the images with advanced computing, to reveal fantastic visions that even Galileo could not have imagined as he turned his little telescope towards the moon and planets. Views of everything from our neighboring planets to planets in different solar systems, to distant galaxies and even black holes! Read on, I’ll show you some of my favorites from the skies of 2020. Read more »

Monday, October 14, 2019

Searching for Exoplanets with Christopher Columbus

Posted on by Leanne Ogasawara

by Leanne Ogasawara

Imagine finding out that intelligent life had been discovered in our galaxy. To learn that across the endless ocean of intergalactic space there exists a planet filled with new forms of life –and riches unimagined: this was how it must have felt for the people of the Renaissance, when Christopher Columbus discovered the New World. After all, there was a reason why the people of the time called it the New World, instead of just the new continent. For this was a revelation; not just of new land, but of sought-after minerals, like gold and silver. It was a new world of tastes. From potatoes to tomatoes and chocolate to corn, the dinner tables of Europe would be transformed in the wake of Columbus’ trip. There were animals never seen in Europe, like the turkey and bison. And there were wondrous new plants and flowers. There was even a new shade of red. Made from the female cochineal insect, this new dye became– after gold– the second largest import from the New World.

Perhaps most astonishing were the people. At a time when Europe was itself organizing into nation-states, often under all-powerful monarchs, Columbus found in the Americas, what seemed to his eyes, to be free and egalitarian societies. Not only did the people not use money, but even more remarkable was their lack of private property. Private property was, after all, the bedrock of the new banking system back home.

And theologically, how were the Europeans to explain a population of people who could not be descended from Noah’s three sons; of human beings ignorant of the New Testament for over a thousand years? Read more »