How we’ll find life on other planets

Day 134 / 365

Are we alone in this universe? That question is probably the main motivation behind the work done in the past few decades in space exploration.

Aomawa Shields is an Astronomer that specializes in the study of climates and habitability of planets outside our solar system. In this TED talk, she explains how her approach to this problem is different than most astronomers.

The Goldilocks Zone

The Goldilocks Zone is the zone around a star that is just at the right distance to support life. Obviously, our planet earth is in the Goldilocks Zone for the sun. A little too close or a little too far, and we wouldn’t have had liquid water on earth to support life.

Scientists have figured out ways to calculate the Goldilocks Zones for others starts thousands of lightyears away from us. If the start happens to have a plant in this zone, there is a chance that it would have liquid water and therefore might support life.

Contradictions to this approach

Aomawa takes the example of our neighboring planet Venus to give a contradiction to the approach described above.

Venus has a very thick atmosphere. The gases in the atmosphere trap a lot of heat in due to the greenhouse effect, which causes the surface temperature to increase to 500 degree Celsius. That is high enough to melt lead.

Thus in the case of Venus, it the atmosphere of the planet, not its distance from the sun that has the most contribution to its unlivable conditions. Thus the atmosphere of a planet plays a crucial role, and we should be paying more attention to it and not just its distance from its sun.

The issue with this approach, however, is that is virtually impossible to calculate the composition of the atmosphere of a planet that is a 1000 light years away from us. For this reason, computer models are used to calculate the kind of atmosphere a planet would need to have a suitable climate for water and life.

This post is part of my 365 Day Project for 2019. Read about it here

Yesterday’s blog — Hobbies for calming your mind