Kepler Mission Could Detect Exomoons

Lord Northern writes "According to several news sources, NASA's Kepler mission is said to be able to detect habitable moons orbiting planets in other star systems. Kepler is a space telescope designed to detect exoplanets. Its mission will have it orbiting the Sun for 3.5 years, after which we'll be able to tell if any of our neighboring stars actually have planetary systems around them. However, apparently we will be able to detect not only exoplanets, but also exomoons orbiting those exoplanets. The Kepler team came to that conclusion after running a computer simulation which found that the telescope was sensitive enough to detect the gravitational pull of an orbiting moon (PDF). This means that the data expected by the end of the mission is going to be very rich, and it is said that moons as small as 0.2 times the mass of earth could be detected. Further details about the Kepler mission are available from NASA."

Comments

That's no moon

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, according to the lightcurve measured by Kepler, it is one. My bad.

Re:article is retarded

[Anonymous Coward]

by that logic a habitable zone is a complete farce as well considering that not all places in the habitable zone are habitable. [eg. Earth's moon]

Re:Obligatory post...

[osu-neko]

... that's no moon

If Kepler says it's a moon, it's a moon. I find your lack of faith disturbing...

Re:article is retarded

[Tablizer]

considering that not all places in the habitable zone are habitable. (eg. Earth's moon)

It was on July 20th, 1969.
   

Re:article is retarded

[Trepidity]

I don't think their use of it is wrong. The title is "On the detectability of habitable exomoons", and the abstract clarifies that to detect "habitable exomoons", this research proposes to detect "habitable-zone exomoons" (that phrase with the -zone qualification appears 4 times in the abstract), because presumably the actually habitable moons will be some subset of those.

its a shame

[chucklebutte]

That my generation (I'm 27) will never get to space, at the current rate nasa is being funded. Id kill to go to space or to another planet. I wish that instead of wasting money on worthless crap we focus more on ditching this rock and finding a better rock! Seriously though going to space would be total pwnage hopefully we will be able to do some 6th day shit and clone ourselves till the day we can go to another planet!

Re:its a shame

[4D6963]

If you're going to space that's not going to be thanks to an exploration agency. NASA is to space tourism as Vasco de Gama is to Atlantic cruises.

Re:its a shame

[smoker2]

Humans have evolved over quite a long while to fit onto this rock and its environment, the chance that you will find a better one are pretty much zero.

No not zero at all. Nowhere near zero in fact. Chance is probability, and the probability is defined by the number of planets, which mathematically works out to "quite a lot". The chances of YOU finding a habitable planet are of course zero because you are not even interested in looking. So far we have a sample size of 8 (9 if you still appreciate Pluto), so to say there is no chance is premature. Not to mention of course the way we evolved to fly at 35000 feet at -50 C at twice the speed of sound.

Space is for most part just empty room that will try to kill you and non-earth planets aren't really much better.

Space does not "try" to do anything. Water does not "try" to drown you, in fact if you take your own air, it can be fun. How many "non-earth" planets do you know of ? How many of them have tried to kill you ? When you last crossed the road, how many cars "tried to kill you" ? What did you do to mitigate this risk ? Or did you see it as inescapable fate and stick to your original side of the road ?
Oceans for the most part are just empty space with storms that try to kill you, and any non-european continents aren't really much better either. Oh wait ...

Re:its a shame

[Nyeerrmm]

Actually, we evolved to fit into the savannas of Africa pretty well, everything after that has been colonization. Theres been some small scale evolution to adapt to new environments, but all of that was after we moved to the new areas, relying on the primary tool evolution gave us: intelligence.

If colonization of other worlds is possible, then its worthwhile. Not because we want to find a better Earth, but because we want to find more Earths. It may very well be that we adapt those worlds to suit us as those worlds adapt the settlers. However, its our adaptability through intelligence that will get us there, and that makes more and more environments suitable for us. The colonizers have never had it easy, but they have a history of adapting and making it better for following generations.

Re:its a shame

[symbolset]

The fossil record seems to indicate that if we don't escape this rock, it will kill us off. It's almost like it's trying to develop a spacefaring species.

Re:its a shame

[bradbury]

If you are 27, then you must have heard about Eric Drexler and Molecular Nanotechnology. Indeed Eric's master's thesis at MIT was on the subject of solar sails and Eric wrote a number of papers [1] about how MNT would enable inexpensive space access.

If you really wanted to go to space you might consider spending less time on wishful thinking and more time on constructive activities. If you were to use the existing (free) Nanoengineer-1 molecular design software to design the nanoscale parts which are elements of a nanoassembler (Nanosystems, pg 401) we would all get there much faster. Once we have a complete nanoassembler design, it can be simulated on a supercomputer to verify that it will function as described and then the race will be on to figure out how to build one [2].

Of course inexpensive access to space and molecular nanoassemblers (or disassemblers) opens up a different can-o-worms like "Which planets we should disassemble to build a Matrioshka Brain for the Kardashev Type II level civilization?" But I suppose if you are still thinking along "vacation in suborbital space" lines that you may not have gotten to that point yet.

1. http://www.aeiveos.com:8080/~bradbury/Authors/Engineering/Drexler-KE/index.html
2. It would take more space than is available here to explain what directed molecular nanoassembly enables but if you consider that DNA polymerase, RNA polymerase and the ribosome are three examples of specific molecular nanoassemblers that produce everything that is considered to be "living", you might get the general idea.

Re:article is retarded

[4D6963]

So much fail. Being in a habitable zone doesn't mean it has to be habitable (hint: habitable means "can be habited"). That's like being a hobo in a rich area, it doesn't mean it's dishonest to call it a rich area just because there's hobos in it. That's like confusing "global warming" for "uniform warming".

Correction for the summary

[Nyeerrmm]

The summary makes one error, suggesting that Kepler is capable of detecting the gravitational 'wobble' caused by a moon. Rather, Kepler, or any system of similar sensitivity, is able to detect the transit of a moon, and recognize it as being distinct from that of the parent planet.

Understandable mistake, since all of the early exo-planet detections were made using the 'wobble' method (detecting the Doppler shift corresponding with a stars motion due to a heavy, close planet). However, the transit method, which measures small dips in the brightness as the planet passes in front of its parent star is far more sensitive, though more difficult to use due to noise constraints.

Basically, imagine if you were looking at our sun from another star system, and Jupiter stood out clearly as a dip in the light curve, reappearing every 8 or 9 years(?). With this, something like Io or Europa would show up as a smaller periodic variation overlaid on that larger dip. Only noise levels are standing in the way of detecting it, and apparently they think Kepler can handle it.

Re:Correction for the summary

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry but you are wrong. Kepler is not able to detect the transit of a moon, it is able to detect the delay in the transit of a planet due to the pull of a moon on that planet.

So it is true that it can "detect the gravitational pull of an orbiting moon", not just using the 'wobble' method as you assume the summary assumed.

Re:Correction for the summary

[zoso1132]

Very nice catch. You are correct. I do mission operations for Kepler (at LASP) and I remember being trained/briefed on the engineering side of things about a year ago. One of the principle investigators (PIs) was there giving an overview of the science and he mentioned "star wobble" as an alternative method of exoplanet detection. Given the numbers he was throwing around talking about Kepler's sensitivity to light (which is outrageously good, at that), someone asked if it could detect "star wobble." He sorta glumly looked back at the guy asking the question and said, "Nope. Wish we could."

Re:article is retarded

[Nadaka]

any given point in earths orbit is completely inhabitable for most of the year as well. The only exception is when the earth is there. Earths moon lacks the mass to contain an atmosphere at its temperature.

A planet like jupiter or larger (as many such large planets have been found) in the "green" zone around a planet could easily have an earth sized moon orbiting it. That is what they are talking about when they mention habitable moons.