NASA introduced 10 new planets that could have life

Planets similar in structure, structure, and possibly climate to Earth, are some of the most attractive to scientists. This is not surprising: after all, water can exist here and, consequently, the atmosphere and life. Recently, the NASA Kepler space telescope team released a catalog of “planet candidates” that lists 219 newly discovered celestial bodies. Ten of them are the size of the Earth, and their distance from their own suns suggests that they may have water.

Candidate minimum

And what kind of “planet candidates” are they? Do they bring resumes, fill out questionnaires and pass exams? In a way, yes.

The fact is that at a very large distance, outside the solar system, it is easy to see only very bright objects, that is, primarily stars. Planets that shine only with reflected light are very dim. Therefore, their detection is still a huge problem even for such powerful telescopes as Kepler. A number of complex scientific techniques are used to help “catch” a distant planet. The space telescope hunts for them, detecting a slight drop in the brightness of the star, which occurs when a planet passes in front of it.

In the photo: Kepler telescope

All finds are carefully checked, and then cataloged.

The new catalog of the Kepler team is the most comprehensive and detailed in four years of operation of the telescope. Now the NASA exoplanet archive has 4,034 candidates identified by Kepler, of which 2335 confirmed the status of exoplanets. Of the approximately 50 candidates in the near-Earth size “life zone”, more than 30 were tested.

This catalog will serve as the basis for further exploration of space in order to determine the abundance and demography of planets in the galaxy. Already, it can be assumed that approximately half of the planets in the Milky Way galaxy, of which we know, are either gaseous or surrounded by an atmosphere in which life is impossible. It was also found out that most often solid planets are 75% larger than the Earth. For reasons that are still unknown, approximately half of these planets absorb a small amount of helium and hydrogen, which leads to an increase in their size.

Jupiter-sized star

Scientists like to compare planet identification with how biologists look for new species of animals. The Kepler Space Telescope continues to observe new areas of the sky in its extended mission. In the area of his interest is not only the search for new planets, but also the study of many interesting astronomical objects, from distant star clusters to systems like TRAPPIST-1, which contains seven terrestrial planets.

TRAPPIST-1 is a single star in the constellation Aquarius at a distance of about 40 light-years from the Sun. It has a red color, much smaller than the Sun in size and 1900 times dimmer. Of the seven planets of the star system, three are in the habitable zone. One of them could potentially be an ocean planet. But, as with other exoplanets that can have life on it, the system is too far away to speak for sure.