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Earth's Corner of the Galaxy Just Got a Little Lonelier
Hugh Pickens writes "Only four stars, including Barnard's Star, are within six light-years of the Sun, and only 11 are within 10 light-years. That's why Barnard's star, popularized in Robert Forward's hard-SF novel Flight of the Dragonfly, is often short-listed as a target for humanity's first interstellar probe. Astronomers have long hoped to find a habitable planet around it, an alien Earth that might someday bear the boot prints of a future Neil Armstrong, or the tire tracks of a souped-up 25th-century Curiosity rover. But now Ross Anderson reports that a group of researchers led by UC Berkeley's Jieun Choi have delivered the fatal blow to those hopes when they revealed the results of 248 precise Doppler measurements that were designed to examine the star for wobbles indicative of planets around it. The measurements, taken over a period of 25 years, led to a depressing conclusion: 'the habitable zone around Barnard's star appears to be devoid of roughly Earth-mass planets or larger ... [p]revious claims of planets around the star by van de Kamp are strongly refuted.' NASA's Kepler space telescope, which studies a group of distant Milky Way stars, has found more than 2,000 exoplanet candidates in just the past two years, leading many to suspect that our galaxy is home to billions of planets, a sizable portion of which could be habitable. 'This non-detection of nearly Earth-mass planets around Barnard's Star is surely unfortunate, as its distance of only 1.8 parsecs would render any Earth-size planets valuable targets for imaging and spectroscopy, as well as compelling destinations for robotic probes by the end of the century.'"
Could be a local hangout.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
What about Alpha Centauri? I suppose the binary nature of the star system could make it hard to detect any planets there.
I don't understand why can't people think about exploring interplanetary space, not planets, but just looking at what a foreign solar system looks like. Sure, it's nice to have planets to land upon, but it's not necessary if you only care about exploration.
Now, if people wanted to 'spread the seed' so to speak (and as a pro-choice person, I don't necessarily endorse the idea), then yeah, it's a loss, but just to explore you don't need Earth type planets.
How about the Earth sized moons in this solar system? Titan?
You can't handle the truth.
When the wise man points at the moon, the naive looks at the stars behind. Go to the Moon, extract water, create an atmosphere, grow plants. Nobody says it's easy. But the whole is likely to take less time than to go to a "near" star and find a "livable" planet...
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
Let's just build a 'tugboat' and take the earth with us and hope the core stays hot enough to keep us from freezing solid. Be ready for a very long night.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Could this just mean that it eliminates any orientation other than either pole of the solar system facing Earth? Absolutely no planets seems so suspicious...
The moon doesn't have enough gravity to hold any usable atmosphere that you would think to create.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
That's why dog invented domes. Also certain electromagnetic fields, etc might be able to hold an atmosphere in place... But if you want a "breathable" atmosphere your choices are mars, possibly Venus. Venus being a bit harder to terraform.
A lack of planet on a nearby star does not mean there is nothing around the star
There might still be fragments of ice / rocks / whatever that humankind can use to construct an artificial planet of some kind
Plus, the lack of existing planet means we get to create one, with our own design
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Now I'm seriously worried. Every time I played Masters of Orion 2 and I got situated in an area where the closest habitable planet was far away I always got my ass kicked by some civilization that was able to expand quickly. Our only hope is to start developing Deuterium fuel cells, and quickly!
The other problem with the lack of gravity is the effect that it has upon humans. We could easily evolve into a supper tall species with brittle bones. If our space exploration continued that could be a major draw back.
Obviously even if we found a habital world tomorrow, we could find ourselves a super tall species with brittle bones.
Whats wrong with a differently sized, but habitable environment planet? And why do we assume that similar sized planets would have similar conditions? It could be entirely different. or even reverse of what we have here.
There goes my nostalgic memories of Frontier II, trading fish from Barnard's star and Luxuries from the Sol system.
Tau Ceti is still plausible though, right?
There is an entire civilisation there, just hiding in plain sight
The Millennium Falcon could do that distance in less than 1.2 parsecs easy.
Douglas Adams can't be wrong! This can only mean the ultimate answer isn't 42. Excuse me while I drown my sorrows in a pan galactic gargle blaster.
Obviously even if we found a habital world tomorrow, we could find ourselves a super tall species with brittle bones.
Unless people stop going all "ZOMG! ITS WRONG TO DO DIRECT GENETIC MODIFICATION!", in that case we might be able to change humans into something that doesn't grow all wonky in microgravity. The more tried method (That humans have done on animals for several thousand years.) is genetic modificaton through selective breeding but that could involve several thousand generations of suffering before we get to a point where we can stay in microgravity for extended times. It might go faster if one makes sacrifices to other less important traits humans have. Being able to smell is probably not that important anyway.
You say the 700C hellhole of burning sulphuric oceans is "a bit harder" to terraform?
That is a bit of an understatement.
I guess Star Wars is not that fictional anymore?
Ihlosi Travel Zuid-Afrika Reizen
I'm pretty sure Douglas adams hasn't written about Barnard's Star.
The upper atmosphere of Venus is much more earth-like though. We just need to figure out how to build a floating colony that can withstand winds of 100m/s.
Maybe the fact that we live in the boondocks of the Universe with no intelligent species within earshot is the only reason our miserable version of organized life has been allowed to survive so long.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
For me, this is just another reason why we ought to be trying to clean up the mess we've made on our home planet instead of placing too much hope on a fallback habitable planet.
I make hardware RNGs, which give 2.5849625 bits of entropy per use in theory (actual performance dependent on usage).
What do you expect? This end of the Western spiral arm is somewhat unfashionable.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Over millions of years, sure. It takes a little while to dissipate.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Plus, the lack of existing planet means we get to create one, with our own design
I wish you damn creationists would stop posting here!
Use engineered bacteria to convert the CO2 in the atmosphere to terraform it. Mars requires an atmosphere, which may have to be obtained from a gas giant or comets.
If we are to explore anything, it should be the places with the most profit potential (that said, there are places on Earth we haven't explored - namely the deep seas)
Given how we have more knowledge on how to make profits on Earth, people would like to seek out Earth-like environments, since more of our existing knowledge could be leveraged.
6 years is a little long to wait for control instructions. If we sent a probe, it'd either be 100% automated (not likely if we ever want to see it again) or we'd have technology to travel there faster or communicate faster. In the case of travel faster we would simply send humans. Why would we send a probe instead?
leading many to suspect that our galaxy is home to billions of planets, a sizable portion of which could be habitable
I guess that depends on your definition of habitable.
Subterranean intelligent life.
We all love the stories, but I'm curious what the last twenty years have suggested as we've become more detailed and accurate with some of our modelings and scientific theories. I *am* wondering what the actual state of science is currently. FTL is proposed to be impossible, but has science concluded that things like wormholes can actually function the way sci-fi suggests and frequently makes use of? Are there any physical properties that don't violate FTL laws, but work around them? Or have we decided that conventional acceleration is the only known way to actually move through space, both in theory and in practice?
The more tried method (That humans have done on animals for several thousand years.) is genetic modificaton through selective breeding
Oblig futurama... death by snu snu! http://www.comedycentral.com/video-clips/yttx80/futurama-death-by-snu-snu
(Sorry, it was the first thing that came to mind.)
You'll never get anywhere outside your ivory towers of academia, damned scientists. In the business world, that answer would get you fired.
We're so ronery.
The advantage of Venus over Mars is that is already has abundant oxygen in the atmosphere, just in a different state than we need it. It's also a lot closer to the sun, so solar power is much more efficient. I wouldn't expect non-domed cities anytime soon, but the materials and resources are there to fuel a domed or underground colony.
Just restart the game, thats what I do.
Barnards Star, Wolf and the Proxima Centauri group are all flare stars - thus not a clever destination for anyone. Most sensible is Lalande 21185 at 8 LY. Barnards is 6 LY.
Currently our best hope of finding life on another planet is to put it there.
I'm thinking Lunar or Martian bio-domes and eventually terraforming.
After all, currently all our eggs (both literally and figuratively) are in one basket.
It is possible that is why we developed to this level and are not conquered by elsewhere.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
bacteria don't thrive that well at temperatures that melt lead.
Yes, except the atmospheric pressure at the surface is gigantic and the solar energy that reaches the surface makes it about as bright as Mars. I'd also talk about the sulfuric acid rain, but due to the pressure, it actually doesn't rain below a certain level of the atmosphere.
Venus *might* be habitable if we can strip off most of the greenhouse gasses and reduce the pressure, but it also doesn't have plate tectonics, its whole crust basically inverts when it is time to release heat from its mantle, so that is a big problem. Consequently, the planet also doesn't have much of a magnetic field.
Venus is the planet equivalent of seeing what looks like a hot girl in a crowd, until "she" turns around and you realize it is a really ugly man with long hair and a beard.
Earth-sized moons far from gas giants within the habitable zone?
Even with the best energy method generation method we know existing (fusion) we are speaking of enormous quantity. just calculate for frigging sake the energy required to make a billion tons (10^12 Kg) into a movement of 1m s-1 then braking it and putting an impulse in the right direction. We are speaking of energy of the order of magnitude of 10^12-10^14 joule here. Now you have to do 10^12 time AGAIN to have something earth sized. We generate today 5.10^20 joule of energy roughly. So we are speaking of an order of magnitude of AT LEAST 10000 time the today#s world energy consumption. And that is a minimum, more likely would be 1 million time and above, on the order of magnitude of the energy emitted by the sun totally over 1 second and sicne 1Kg of matter has got about 10^16 joule of energy , we are speaking of anihilation of 10^8 to 10^10 Kg of matter. That's not even counting the time you would have to wait for your planet to cool down.
You are not speaking of new tech but of MAGIC. Star trek or star wars can do it, but it is not realistic, and no a new tech will not change basic energy requirement. And no, getting the "new tech in future" card will not help. You cannot take past progress as an indication of future progress. We may find new way of generating energy, or we may be stuck until extinction with what we have. You have no way to tell. As such you can only take into account what we know now of the universe, and it is quite dire for us.
Seriously.. think outside the box a little. Even if the habitable zone, for us, around that star is empty, it doesn't means anything.
A lack of planet on a nearby star does not mean there is nothing around the star
And, even more to the point, a lack of a planet larger than ten times the Earth's mass in an Earth-like orbit, or two times Earth's mass in a close-in (ten day) orbit says nothing about the presence or absence of Earth- mass planets, unless you have a well-accepted theory showing that systems with Earthlike planets must also have Jupiter-like planets, which is a theory we don't have.
That's according to what the actual article says-- ignore the Slashdot summary, it's wrong. http://arxiv.org/abs/1208.2273
And, worse, the mass detection limits are limits on m*sin(i)-- if the orbits are inclined, the planet masses that couldn't be detected would be even larger. (in the limit, if the orbit is face on, it wouldn't have detected planets regardless of how massive they are)
Overall conclusion: This puts limits on planets around Barnard's star, but did not have the ability to detect, and thus did not rule out, Earth-mass planets.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Send a probe to another star by the end of the century, really! I'd like what they are smoking. At current technology, that would take about 8,000 years to get there. Using space sales, that might be reduced to 3,000 years. Using a nuclear pulse engine, that could be reduced to 300 years. Of course, they better develop deflector shields, too, because at the velocity of a nuclear pulse engine, a small particle has the potential to destroy the probe given the kinetic energy involved and as we all know, space is not empty.
We would have to also develop some sort of AI to control everything, because at those distances, it isn't practical to send instructions via radio wave. The time to transmit and receive is much too long (it takes light 6 years to get here). Then again, such a system will need additional power, which increases the size of the on board reactor (solar panels just don't work well that far from a light source). Of course a bigger reactor requires a bigger pulse engine which means a bigger reactor. Or, it could go slower, but then that defeats the purpose.
And of course, any computer system would need to be able to run continuously for centuries (if they go the solar sail route, they better plan for the Y3K bug).
Theoretically this can all be done, but is it practical. What is the likely hood that a probe launched today, assuming all of the technological inventions that would have to occur, have occurred, would still be functioning in 3 centuries when it first arrives, if it even arrives?
I'm all for funding of scientific research, but surely there must be something that provides just as much bang for the buck and is more practical and likely to succeed.
Could be that they are hiding the habitable world. If I had neighbors like us thinking of visiting, I would.
Too bad. That would have been cool. What about the gas giant's habitable moon? IIRC, it wasn't in the habitable zone, but heat from the gas giant made up the difference.
What is your resistance to using the work billion? It isn't a dirty word.
Also, I agree with you mostly on this. They only way I can see people making a planet is by making self replicating robots that can mine the universe for energy and minerals and have them do all the work. If they can build themselves expoentially and are somewhat networked they could be "told" to go forth and multiply and make us a planet. It still wouldn't be a weekend endevour though.
Ninjas don't carry tic tacs
The upper atmosphere of Venus is much more earth-like though. We just need to figure out how to build a floating colony that can withstand winds of 100m/s without using any metals, since we can't mine them from the sky.
I'm not saying it's impossible, just pointing out the challenges. (I'm a different AC.)
Over millions of years, sure. It takes a little while to dissipate.
Are you sure it takes millions of years to dissipate and not maybe a dozen years? Did you just make that number up?
No one has a right to their *own* opinion. They have a right to the TRUTH.
20 Leonis Minoris http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/20_Leonis_Minoris
Type G3 Va/M6.5 like the Sun (Sol)
49.1 lightyears from Earth
Home to a hostile invasion force bent on replacing humanity with their creation of a hybrid species they control.
You are not speaking of new tech but of MAGIC.
That's what people in the past would've said about our technology. You do not know what the future holds. We don't know nearly enough about everything that is possible for you to make such a claim.
B.S. All this means is that there are no planet that "TRANSIT" the star (crossing between the star and us). Still lots of potential orbital positions for planets to exist that do not transit the star. I really wish the media would quit spinning all stories into tales of doom and destruction. Be a friggin journalist, jeez...
We could build the colony inside some kind of baloon. The hull of the baloon could be made of some carbon-based polymer, which can be formed from the CO2 from the atmosphere. ;)
Hmm, let's build this
The whole "Earth's Corner of the Galaxy Just Got a Little Lonelier" and "an alien Earth that might someday bear the boot prints of a future Neil Armstrong" angle is kind of dumb. Seriously, once we start talking about interstellar distances, whether something is 8 vs 4 light-years away is really irrelevant. Using another post's numbers, if we can achieve a speed five times that of the Voyager probes, it's going to take us 1,400 years to get to alpha centauri. but if we double our speed, it'll *only* take 700 years. So unless you're Methuselah or Nicholas Flamel, that's about 10 times as long as you expect to live.
Proper (i.e. British) English used to use the long scale, where a billion was a million million (10 e12).
By "used to", I mean up until about forty years ago. Of course, it was just an excuse for that Harold bastard Wilson to put up prices, like that new-fangled decimal money.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
....they were demolished for a hyper-space bypass..... ....those damn Vogon constructor fleets.
There are 2 groups of people you can make fun of on the Internet without fear of attack. The illiterate, and the Amish.
I like good ol American, Occidental science. The issue is very sensitive! Basically, it was Occident who declared a space program, independently of any external pressure. In India we still have disputes whether to dedicated scientists to harvest rice or investigate space! For instance... There are interests around the search for ET life and even for such research. (this text can grow a lot). I definitely think such studies should be repeated several times. There is PLENTY of space to HIDE a target planet... (pun). Danilo J Bonsignore
1.8 parsecs! Ptttthhhh! That's less than the Kessel run!!!!!
Sure enough, the cow costume was hanging up next to the superhero outfit and sailors uniform. (S,Spud)