Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff from how Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: luring vogel Bomb. Here, a very special alien world has
Speaker 1: been discovered on our galactic doorstep, and it may have
Speaker 1: the secret sauce that allows life as we know it
Speaker 1: to exist on its surface. Enter Ross B, an Earth
Speaker 1: sized exoplanet that likely orbits its star in the habitable zone.
Speaker 1: What makes this exoplanet discovery so exciting is that it's
Speaker 1: located only eleven light years away, Plus it's red dwarf
Speaker 1: star appears to be inactive. That means that this newly
Speaker 1: discovered world may not face the radioactive ravages that other
Speaker 1: exoplanets likely endure, thereby boosting its habitable potential. Astronomers detected
Speaker 1: Ross one using the European Southern Observatories High accuracy radial
Speaker 1: velocity planet searcher A K. A. Harps at the Lascia
Speaker 1: Observatory in Chile. They measured the slight wobbles of the
Speaker 1: star caused by the orbiting exoplanet. In a study published
Speaker 1: in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, the researchers calculated the
Speaker 1: exo planet's mass and orbital period. A year on Ross
Speaker 1: B is slightly less than ten earth days, so the
Speaker 1: distance at which it whips around its star is very close.
Speaker 1: But as the red dwarf is so tiny and cool,
Speaker 1: the exoplanet receives a similar amount of solar heating as
Speaker 1: our planet receives from the Sun. Red dwarfs are the
Speaker 1: most common type of star in our galaxy, and many
Speaker 1: are known to possess planetary systems. The closest star to
Speaker 1: our Solar system, Proximus Centauri, is a red dwarf, and
Speaker 1: in astronomers made the historic discovery of a small Earth
Speaker 1: sized exoplanet in its orbit. That world, called Proxima B,
Speaker 1: is the closest habitable zone exo planet to us, and
Speaker 1: may even have a temperate atmosphere that could support an
Speaker 1: alien ecosystem. However, Proxima Centauri is a violent star that
Speaker 1: regularly erupts with powerful flares and pumps out X ray
Speaker 1: and ultra violet radiation, which tend to be deadly to
Speaker 1: life as we know it. If life could evolve on
Speaker 1: Proxima B, and that's a big if, the planet would
Speaker 1: need a very powerful magnetosphere a global magnetic feeld to
Speaker 1: deflect those powerful stellar winds and thus prevent its atmosphere
Speaker 1: from being stripped away and to prevent any life forms
Speaker 1: from being irradiated. Ross, on the other hand, lives next
Speaker 1: to an inactive red dwarf star one that isn't blasting
Speaker 1: local space with a massive dose of radiation. In fact,
Speaker 1: according to an E. S O statement, Ross one is
Speaker 1: the quietest nearby star to host such a temperate exoplanet.
Speaker 1: Despite being twenty times closer to its star than Earth
Speaker 1: is to the Sun, Ross only receives thirty eight percent
Speaker 1: more radiation. If it does have an atmosphere, life might
Speaker 1: have had an opportunity to gain a foothold without getting fried.
Speaker 1: Although radiation may not be a problem, orbiting so close
Speaker 1: to a red dwarf star presents a unique situation for
Speaker 1: habitable zone exoplanets like Ross. For example, researchers expect that
Speaker 1: the planet is tidally locked. Tidal locking occurs when a
Speaker 1: planet orbits close to its star, like the Moon is
Speaker 1: tidally locked with Earth. That's the reason why we only
Speaker 1: ever see one side of the Moon facing Us as
Speaker 1: it orbits the planet. Exoplanets with compact orbits are also
Speaker 1: expected to become tidally locked with their stars. One hemispheres
Speaker 1: perpetually facing the star and the other hemisphere is always
Speaker 1: facing away, but this wouldn't necessarily be a death sentence.
Speaker 1: With the right atmosphere or proportion of land masses two oceans,
Speaker 1: heat from the star could be distributed from the planet's
Speaker 1: warm daylight side to the cool side in perpetual darkness.
Speaker 1: For now, however, though ROSS is an exciting discovery, there's
Speaker 1: no way of knowing if the nearby world even possesses
Speaker 1: an atmosphere, let alone whether that hypothetical atmosphere has the
Speaker 1: right chemical balance for life to thrive. In July, the
Speaker 1: air Cebo radio telescope in Puerto Rico detected a mysterious
Speaker 1: low frequency signal emanating from the ROSS system. Although there
Speaker 1: was some excitement for the possibility of a SETI like
Speaker 1: alien radio signal, stromers think that this is the least
Speaker 1: likely explanation, favoring the detection of an as yet unexplained
Speaker 1: stellar phenomenon or a rogue signal from an orbiting satellite.
Speaker 1: When the next ration of ground and space based telescopes
Speaker 1: go online, such as the E s O S Extremely
Speaker 1: Large Telescope and NASA's James Webb Space Telescope for US,
Speaker 1: will become a prime target for astronomers to look for
Speaker 1: the spectroscopic clues of chemicals that could be produced by
Speaker 1: an alien biosphere. Telescopes like the Extremely Large Telescope will
Speaker 1: be on the lookout for water, a substance that is
Speaker 1: essential in its liquid form for all life as we
Speaker 1: know it, but also possible bio markers like dioxygen, ozone, methane,
Speaker 1: and carbon dioxide, which could betray the presence of a
Speaker 1: habitable or even possibly inhabited atmosphere, though of course, individually
Speaker 1: none of these chemicals would provide definite proof for life.
Speaker 1: Today's episode was written by Ian O'Neill and produced by
Speaker 1: Tristan McNeil No Relation. For more on this and lots
Speaker 1: of other extraterrestrial topics, visit our home planet pow staff
Speaker 1: works dot com.