New Super Earth may be hospitable for life

[T V]

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/11/121108073927.htm

The new super-Earth planet exists in the habitable zone of a nearby star and is part of a six-planet system. The system was previously thought to contain three planets in orbits too close to the star to support liquid water. By avoiding fake signals caused by stellar activity, the researchers have identified three new super-Earth planet candidates also in orbit.

Of the new planets, the one of greatest interest is the one with the outermost orbit from the star -- with a mass at least seven times of the Earth. Its orbit around the host star is at a similar distance to Earth's orbit around our Sun, so it receives a similar amount of energy from the star as the Earth receives from the Sun -- increasing the probability of it being habitable. This is where the presence of liquid water and stable atmospheres to support life is possible and, more importantly, the planet is likely to be rotating on its own axis as it orbits around the star creating a daytime and night-time effect on the planet which would be better at creating an Earth-like environment.

Of the new planets, the one of greatest interest is the one with the outermost orbit from the star -- with a mass at least seven times of the Earth. Its orbit around the host star is at a similar distance to Earth's orbit around our Sun, so it receives a similar amount of energy from the star as the Earth receives from the Sun -- increasing the probability of it being habitable. This is where the presence of liquid water and stable atmospheres to support life is possible and, more importantly, the planet is likely to be rotating on its own axis as it orbits around the star creating a daytime and night-time effect on the planet which would be better at creating an Earth-like environment.

Earlier this year, the Kepler spacecraft found a planet with a similar orbit. However, Kepler 22d is located 600 light years from Earth, whereas this new super-Earth planet known as HD 40307g is much closer being located at 42 light years from Earth.

Now I want to put forth a hypothetical question. Let's fast forward to a time when we've obtained a means of reaching this planet quickly and comfortably. When we get there, we find that there exists complex life forms less civilized than us. Would you rather we turn return to Earth and leave these life forms to their own planet, or should be remain on the planet, study it, and maybe even begin colonizing it?

How do you think we should handle an encounter with alien life (although technically in this scenario, we'd be the aliens)?

Consider our own planet's history of imperialism and colonialism.

 

[Emperor Nero]

I am sure people would want to colonize it and try to take it over.

I believe though that mutual intellectual inquiries about the different civilizations would be beneficial. Maybe a small scientific/historical/cultural detachment that is the least intrusive as possible. We would really have to worry about diseases and bacteria and stuff like that.

 

[Loyal 2 da game]

Watch it happen, that when we colonize it, there's some super virus on it that kills all of us.

Could make a cool movie.

 

[Divine_God]

7X the size of earth.

We would hardly be able to stand. So I don't see us colonizing it but more likely utilizing it for its resources.

 

[I KO I]

History says we could conquer and colonize it.

Look at what happened when the Spaniard came to the West Indies. Natives died left and right, although their main motive was the search of gold and profit.

The British conquering the Native Americans would be a more apt example. Once we had enough strength to conqueror these "aliens" we would do so.

After all, we would be the ones discovering them and not the other way around.
Although it would be amazing if they reached Earth before we reached them.

Of course this is all hypothetical. Earth may be the only planet with living organisms such as us, only the human mind can imagine such a fantasy.

 

[Jedi Mind Tricked]

I doubt it'd be colonized by us however the use of resources could be extracted like a previous poster said and with those resources, our world may live longer etc

It's a shame none of this would occur in our life times

 

[Terrankiller]

So this planet has two of the thousands of variables needed to support human colonization. Lets go colonize it right now I'm sure it will all work out.

 

[Lame]

If history is any kind of guide we will in fact kill anything that is breathing, take it and claim it as our own. Then strip the planet of any resources it has.

 

[x339]

Given our human nature, I am sure we can all agree that we would begin colonizing immediately. It would be interesting to see how our nature clashed with theirs though.

 

[Noam]

Given human nature, assuming the planet is habitable (which it isn't cause 7g is deadly for long periods of time) and colonized it's really a case of moving forwards since it's effectively going to be a boat>plane scenario. Humans will kill off any interference and conservation would come second to science.
Honestly it's hard to kill off entire species if you start from 0, it would take a good amount of time to completely destroy any areas of such a planet let alone any particularly rich ones.

But most of all a planet with life similar to earth's and with 7g is going to be a fucking huge oil field

 

[SexayMistahBee]

By the time that we do have the ability to travel at the speed of light, I'm very sure that we'd already gone extinct, or have the appropriate technology to help us handle 7Gs.

It's too bad that we wont see a planet being colonized in our lifetimes

 

[kill dank]

Funny thing is that there's probably millions of planets like ours that can sustain life... But we would never be able to get to it in our life time.

I mean, there are ways to get there, but nobody that was part of the take off would be around for the landing.. There's a big shit that goes on with this. It's crazy in-depth.

 

[Noam]

Funny thing is that there's probably millions of planets like ours that can sustain life... But we would never be able to get to it in our life time.

I mean, there are ways to get there, but nobody that was part of the take off would be around for the landing.. There's a big shit that goes on with this. It's crazy in-depth.

Take a step back and move in the fourth dimension. I assume it would be similar to the uncertainty principle in electron orbitals - it's impossible to tell where they are because they don't move, they simply exist in one point and then in another.

 

[kill dank]

Take a step back and move in the fourth dimension. I assume it would be similar to the uncertainty principle in electron orbitals - it's impossible to tell where they are because they don't move, they simply exist in one point and then in another.

Well, yes, that.. But assuming that's impossible, the only way to reach something that far away would be send a self-sustaining ship with a predetermined course to one of these planets.

The crew is the hard part, obviously people wouldn't live long enough to ever see these planets, so they would have to be able to reproduce and create a society that lives entirely inside the ship from birth until death for multiple generations. The problem with this is that there are so many things that can go wrong, but I'm not going into them unless anyone wants to discuss it.

The other alternative to a crew of that sort, would be to store DNA or a human embryo in conditions that would preserve it for thousands of years, then have a robot create the humans artificially in the ship upon landing. There are also many problems with this.

Generally speaking, there are a lot of kinks to work out of the ideas that are possible right now before any of them would be remotely worth exploring.

 

[T V]

Well, yes, that.. But assuming that's impossible, the only way to reach something that far away would be send a self-sustaining ship with a predetermined course to one of these planets.

The crew is the hard part, obviously people wouldn't live long enough to ever see these planets, so they would have to be able to reproduce and create a society that lives entirely inside the ship from birth until death for multiple generations. The problem with this is that there are so many things that can go wrong, but I'm not going into them unless anyone wants to discuss it.

The other alternative to a crew of that sort, would be to store DNA or a human embryo in conditions that would preserve it for thousands of years, then have a robot create the humans artificially in the ship upon landing. There are also many problems with this.

Generally speaking, there are a lot of kinks to work out of the ideas that are possible right now before any of them would be remotely worth exploring.

Like mistahbee said, couldn't light speed travel (or something close to it) could be a solution? that's assuming we're around long enough to become that advanced of course

 

[rue]

It depends on how advanced the lifeforms are, perhaps they would be interested in traveling back to Earth and recolonizing us. If we were clearly dominant, then I could imagine human beings creating a monarchy as opposed to a democracy. The benefit would be an extremely large vacation spot for us, and even a permanent place of residence.

 

[kill dank]

Like mistahbee said, couldn't light speed travel (or something close to it) could be a solution? that's assuming we're around long enough to become that advanced of course

Absolutely. Before my previous statement, I noted that it was based under the assumption that lightspeed travel is currently impossible.

Basically, people have two options. Try it now with one of the ideas I mentioned, or wait for light speed travel..

If they wait for light speed travel, they would speed past any sort of ship they could send out now so it would be pointless in the long run. Maybe that's why there's no attempt.

 

[T V]

It depends on how advanced the lifeforms are, perhaps they would be interested in traveling back to Earth and recolonizing us. If we were clearly dominant, then I could imagine human beings creating a monarchy as opposed to a democracy. The benefit would be an extremely large vacation spot for us, and even a permanent place of residence.

In the scenario I gave the lifeforms are less advanced than us

Absolutely. Before my previous statement, I noted that it was based under the assumption that lightspeed travel is currently impossible.

Basically, people have two options. Try it now with one of the ideas I mentioned, or wait for light speed travel..

If they wait for light speed travel, they would speed past any sort of ship they could send out now so it would be pointless in the long run. Maybe that's why there's no attempt.

Light speed travel would be pointless in the long run? What do you mean?



I didn't really want to go into the realisticness or the technicalities of it. My emphasis was more on hearing how you guys think an encounter withs less developed e.t. life should be handled

 

[Hyped Gamer]

super-Earth Gliese 876 d would have a surface gravity between 1.9g and 3.3g


Due to the larger mass of super-Earths, their physical characteristics differ from Earth's. A study on Gliese 876 d by a team around Diana Valencia[1] revealed that it would be possible to infer from a radius measured by the transit method of detecting planets and the mass of the relevant planet what the structural composition of a relevant super-Earth is. For Gliese 876, calculations range from 9,200 km (1.4 Earth radii) for a rocky planet and very large iron core to 12,500 km (2.0 Earth radii) for a watery and icy planet. Within this range of radii the super-Earth Gliese 876 d would have a surface gravity between 1.9g and 3.3g (19 and 32 m/s²).

 

[KerokeroCola]

7X the size of earth.

We would hardly be able to stand. So I don't see us colonizing it but more likely utilizing it for its resources.

Actually gravitational force is directly proportional to mass but inversely proportional to the square of the distance from the center of mass. I didn't see anywhere where it said the size of the planet, but provided it is about 2.5 times larger in diameter than the Earth, the gravity will be essentially the same.

Edit: Hyped beat me while I was still reading the rest of the responses it seems.


I guess to further the discussion:

Colonizing the planet would depend on a vast majority of factors. Is there sufficient plant life to combat whatever CO2-producing elements we introduce to the planet, or will we deplete its atmosphere of oxygen faster than photosynthesizers can combat? I guess by the time we can travel that far in any measurable amount of time, we would have invented methods of converting matter, so maybe my point is moot.