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Kepler Mission Has Found More Than 1,200 Exoplanet Candidates
By Elizabeth Landau, CNN
POSTED: 11:48 am EDT September 14, 2011
UPDATED: 12:49 pm EDT September 14, 2011


(CNN) -- It's not like aliens put up a welcome banner or anything, but
scientists now have newly identified at least one planet that could
potentially sustain life. 

The European Southern Observatory has just announced the discovery of
more than 50 new exoplanets (planets outside our solar system),
including 16 super-Earths (planets whose mass is between one and 10
times that of our own planet). 

One of these planets in particular could theoretically be home to life
if conditions are right. It's called HD 85512 b, and scientists say
it's about 3.6 times the mass of the Earth. This planet is about 35
light years from Earth. Its location with respect to its star suggests
that this planet could have liquid water under certain circumstances. 

Don't get too excited, though; there's a lot more work to be done to
explore whether this planet is truly fit for life, in addition to
whether there are alien life forms there. 

The discovery comes from High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet
Searcher, or HARPS. HARPS is located at the La Silla Observatory in
Chile, and is part of a telescope that's nearly 12 feet long. 

Here's how it works, according to ESO: When a planet orbits a star,
the star move toward and away from the person who's stargazing on
Earth in a regular fashion. That's called a change in radial velocity.
Because of the Doppler effect, changes in radial velocity make the
star's light spectrum move toward longer wavelengths when it's moving
away, and toward shorter wavelengths as it gets closer. HARPS can
detect this shift in the spectrum, and infer that there is a planet
present. 

So far, scientists have confirmed the existence of 564 planets outside
of our solar system, according to NASA's PlanetQuest website, not
counting this latest batch of more than 50. Beyond that, NASA's Kepler
mission has found more than 1,200 exoplanet candidates. 

"In the coming 10 to 20 years we should have the first list of
potentially habitable planets in the Sun's neighbourhood. Making such
a list is essential before future experiments can search for possible
spectroscopic signatures of life in the exoplanet atmospheres," said
Michel Mayor, who led the HARPS team, in a statement.


Read more:
http://www.wlwt.com/technology/29181637/detail.html#ixzz1XxIgx5Dl


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