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[EviLore]

Astronomers have discovered a potentially habitable world just 31 light-years away, thanks to NASA's planet-hunting telescope

TESS, a space telescope searching for alien worlds, helped astronomers discover a potentially watery new planet. It's one of the nearest known worlds.

www.businessinsider.com.au

• NASA’sTransiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite telescope discovered a new planet orbiting a star in the Hydra constellation. When scientists examined the data, they noticed two other planets circling the star.
• One of these new worlds could support liquid water if its atmosphere is thick enough. Scientists need to study it further to find out whether that’s the case.
• At only 31 light-years away, the newly discovered planet is among the closest exoplanets ever detected.

Just 31 light-years away, one of the closest worlds ever detected could harbour liquid water on its surface.

NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, or TESS – a super-powerful orbiting telescope that scouts the sky for alien worlds – spotted a new planet circling a nearby star in the Hydra constellation. When astronomers checked the star for confirmation, they discovered two more worlds orbiting it.

One of those planets, called GJ 357 d, could support liquid water if it turns out to have a thick atmosphere and be made of rock.

It’s among the 45 closest exoplanets confirmed to date, out of a total 4,025 planets tallied so far outside our solar system.

A potentially watery world
This planet system is the third-closest identified using the “transit” method, in which telescopes watch for tiny dips in a star’s brightness that could be caused by a planet passing in front of it. The Kepler telescope pioneered the technique, though it’s been refined by TESS.

The promising planet is in its star’s “habitable zone,” the range of distances in which a rocky world could have the right surface temperature for liquid water to exist.

“GJ 357 d is located within the outer edge of its star’s habitable zone, where it receives about the same amount of stellar energy from its star as Mars does from the Sun,” Diana Kossakowski, a member of the team that discovered the planet, said in a press release.

“If the planet has a dense atmosphere, which will take future studies to determine, it could trap enough heat to warm the planet and allow liquid water on its surface,” Kossakowski said.

 

[Avasarala]

But... where are the mountains?

 

[Geki-D]

6.1 times Earth's mass. That's some strong gravity, more than we could stand. Also whilst it's the closest, we still need to travel at the speed of light for 31 years to get there. So it's still pretty far.

But... where are the mountains?

Apparently it's a water world.

 

[JareBear: Remastered]

Can't wait to live there in my Cloud AI form that gets uploaded right before my physical body dies.

 

[greyshark]

I wonder what kind of life would evolve on a planet with such dense gravity.

 

[JareBear: Remastered]

I wonder what kind of life would evolve on a planet with such dense gravity.

 

[Musky_Cheese]

6.1 times Earth's mass. That's some strong gravity, more than we could stand. Also whilst it's the closest, we still need to travel at the speed of light for 31 years to get there. So it's still pretty far.

Apparently it's a water world.

I seen that movie. That life seems hard af

 

[BlackOlivesMatter]

I wonder if their cheeks are ready to get clapped?

 

[God Enel]

But... where are the mountains?

 

[Avasarala]

yah - there’s the mountains!

 

[Slings and Arrows]

Miss 31 E3's on Gaf and visit a new planet?

Hard pass.

 

[Tesseract]

Can't wait to live there in my Cloud AI form that gets uploaded right before my physical body dies.

yer born too early, death awaits

 

[Trogdor1123]

White dwarfs are really interesting stars, they last an incredibly long time so there will probably be billions of more years to evolve life there than our planet will even exist for but I think they have frequent solar events which could challenge life as well.

Could be very interesting, at least at some point. I think if it is barren of life it would make an excellent place to dump a few billion bacteria at and see what happens.

 

[Torrent of Pork]

Not that things like this aren't cool from a, "Fuck yeah, science," standpoint, but habitable planets are kind of pointless and wasteful when we could just build enough O'neil cylinders to house an unimaginable number of people. By the time we got around to mounting a manned 31 LY mission I would expect the solar system to hold quintillions (not a typo) of people.

 

[SLoWMoTIoN]

Kay so 1 light year usually means around 93 million miles away right? This is 31 light years away. Nobody can travel in space for that long. Our bodies would never make it. Not to mention fuel and food. By the time we CAN travel there would this planet still be there? At that location?

 

[Avasarala]

No, ~93M miles is one AU. (Astronomical Unit)
Average distance from Sol to Earth.

A light year is the distance light travels in a year.

186,000 miles per second, times 60 for minutes, 60 for hours, 24 for days, then 365 for a year.

Very roughly, 5,865,696,000,000 miles.

Times 31.

That’s.... extremely nearby, actually!

“Space is big; really, really big. You just wouldn’t believe how absolutely mind-bogglingly big it is...” -D. Adams

 

[Torrent of Pork]

No, ~93M miles is one AU. (Astronomical Unit)
Average distance from Sol to Earth.

A light year is the distance light travels in a year.

186,000 miles per second, times 60 for minutes, 60 for hours, 24 for days, then 365 for a year.

Very roughly, 5,865,696,000,000 miles.

Times 31.

That’s.... extremely nearby, actually!

“Space is big; really, really big. You just wouldn’t believe how absolutely mind-bogglingly big it is...” -D. Adams

Yeah, 31 LY is simultaneously right next door and so mind-numbingly far away depending on your perspective. Perhaps with something theoretically possible like a ship powered by a Kugelblitz singularity we might get a respectable sized colony ship there in a few hundred years, but we're talking about so many orders of magnitude of technological advancement that we might not even be fully human anymore many hundreds of years from now.

Assuming of course we don't wipe ourselves out in some fashion.

 

[Insane Metal]

And that's just the beginning. TESS will find A LOT more.

 

[cryptoadam]

Dems new platform, if we don't get to GJ 357 d in 12 years we all die!

 

[SLoWMoTIoN]

No, ~93M miles is one AU. (Astronomical Unit)
Average distance from Sol to Earth.

A light year is the distance light travels in a year.

186,000 miles per second, times 60 for minutes, 60 for hours, 24 for days, then 365 for a year.

Very roughly, 5,865,696,000,000 miles.

Times 31.

That’s.... extremely nearby, actually!

“Space is big; really, really big. You just wouldn’t believe how absolutely mind-bogglingly big it is...” -D. Adams

Ok, so how long would it take for us to travel there? Do we have the technology? (no)?

 

[Tesseract]

we have neither the tech nor the physical means to travel those distances without sacrificing individuality

 

[TrainedRage]

Look man, if I didn't see it on Ancient Aliens it just isn't true!

 

[petran79]

If we send a satellite with fossilised bacteria maybe it will reach it in a few million years

 

[-Minsc-]

Not that things like this aren't cool from a, "Fuck yeah, science," standpoint, but habitable planets are kind of pointless and wasteful when we could just build enough O'neil cylinders to house an unimaginable number of people. By the time we got around to mounting a manned 31 LY mission I would expect the solar system to hold quintillions (not a typo) of people.

Let's strip Mars to its core in order to get the resources to do so.

 

[Dontero]

Ok, so how long would it take for us to travel there? Do we have the technology? (no)?

We do have technology to reach even end of infinite universe in manner of few years. The problem is debris along the way that will kill us. And by debris i mean molecules of stuff or even bigger atoms.

Constant acceleration is name of the game. If you can accelerate at 1G speed (around 9,8m/s) not only you will have gravity generator for ship as people who are in that ship won't see a difference compared to earth but if you accelerate constantly at that speed you will get to Alpha Centauri (our closest star) in manner of less than a year, in few years you will be flying so fast that crossing galaxy would happen in real time, with one more year you would be so fast that you would be able to reach distant galaxy in few days, with few more years you will be speeding so fast that you will be out of our observable universe. Constant non stop acceleration even with very minute speed is very very very scary and something most of people don't know.

The catch ? Everything above will be only from your point of perspective. For everyone else observing you, you will never get faster than speed of light and basically from their point of perspective it will take 100s or thousands years to reach our closest star and milions to reach end of our galaxy.

Relativity is crazy when you first hear about it but then you learn more and the deeper you go then even weirder it gets.

“Space is big; really, really big. You just wouldn’t believe how absolutely mind-bogglingly big it is...” -D. Adams

And then you learn about relativity and you realize that it is not that space is big. It is that our universe rules are created in such way that everything is near us, despite everything being theoretically away.

For example if you don't have a mass, like photon. Time and space does not exist for you. Which means light you see everyday does not experience time or even distance. The moment light is generated it arrives at the end of journey regardless of distance from its point of reference.

 

[bitbydeath]

Is it flat too?

 

[-Minsc-]

We do have technology to reach even end of infinite universe in manner of few years. The problem is debris along the way that will kill us. And by debris i mean molecules of stuff or even bigger atoms.

Constant acceleration is name of the game. If you can accelerate at 1G speed (around 9,8m/s) not only you will have gravity generator for ship as people who are in that ship won't see a difference compared to earth but if you accelerate constantly at that speed you will get to Alpha Centauri (our closest star) in manner of less than a year, in few years you will be flying so fast that crossing galaxy would happen in real time, with one more year you would be so fast that you would be able to reach distant galaxy in few days, with few more years you will be speeding so fast that you will be out of our observable universe. Constant non stop acceleration even with very minute speed is very very very scary and something most of people don't know.

The catch ? Everything above will be only from your point of perspective. For everyone else observing you, you will never get faster than speed of light and basically from their point of perspective it will take 100s or thousands years to reach our closest star and milions to reach end of our galaxy.

Relativity is crazy when you first hear about it but then you learn more and the deeper you go then even weirder it gets.




And then you learn about relativity and you realize that it is not that space is big. It is that our universe rules are created in such way that everything is near us, despite everything being theoretically away.

For example if you don't have a mass, like photon. Time and space does not exist for you. Which means light you see everyday does not experience time or even distance. The moment light is generated it arrives at the end of journey regardless of distance from its point of reference.

Basically, what you are saying is God will always be superior to us due to our own limitations.

This brings to mind a mind bender question which I know others have discussed in depth before. When travelling, are we moving through space or is space moving past us? It's easy for me to say we move through space from the perspective of standing on the earth. When scaling up, for some reason, the idea that we are standing still and space is moving past us starts to make more sense. I guess that's what relativity may be.

 

[timeflais]

Operation paperclip.
Redundant?
Gatekeepers of knowledge for special interests.
Public announcements generations behind truth.

 

[DeafTourette]

Warp travel is theoretically possible and NASA did calculations stating the energy required wouldn't be as astronomical as previously thought to power such a drive/ship. We could get there in maybe a few years or months with such method and bypass all the space debris that could kill us.

 

[Prison Mike]

I got pissed off travelling bk n forth Greece to UK when I moved to Greece n that only took 4 hours lol

 

[ULTROS!]

I guess it will take about 1.1 million years if you want to go to that planet (that's assuming the craft you're riding takes 5 miles a second), not bad!

 

[Prison Mike]

I guess it will take about 1.1 million years if you want to go to that planet (that's assuming the craft you're riding takes 5 miles a second), not bad!

One expensive uber

 

[greyshark]

Voyager 1 (a probe launched in 1977) will fly by a star 17.6 light years away in about 40,000 years, so I don't think it's as impossible as it sounds. Its current speed is about 38,000 mph.

 

[Weilthain]

Do they have an awesome cartoon to show this time?

The thing I love about space is all the cartoons.

 

[Tesseract]

Operation paperclip.
Redundant?
Gatekeepers of knowledge for special interests.
Public announcements generations behind truth.

bro are you okay

the paperclip dudes are all dead

 

[Geki-D]

Voyager 1 (a probe launched in 1977) will fly by a star 17.6 light years away in about 40,000 years, so I don't think it's as impossible as it sounds. Its current speed is about 38,000 mph.

At that speed it would take over 550,000 odd years to travel 31 light years... I don't even think the human race will be around anymore at that point. It really is impossible.

 

[Axelotl]

31 lyrs is basically in our backyard. Awesome.

 

[SLoWMoTIoN]

Look man, if I didn't see it on Ancient Aliens it just isn't true!

You are way too stoned to be reading this thread man.

 

[timeflais]

bro are you okay

the paperclip dudes are all dead

As are the original founders of freemasonry, and yet they still pollute society today.

 

[greyshark]

At that speed it would take over 550,000 odd years to travel 31 light years... I don't even think the human race will be around anymore at that point. It really is impossible.

200 years ago I bet the notion of traveling our solar system was thought impossible, and now we have close up shots of Pluto. Maybe it’s impossible, but maybe we figure out a way. I think we will

 

[Trogdor1123]

People keep talking about traveling there but that isnt the biggest thing here. There is a chance to actually communicate with them inside of a single person's life span. That's incredible. You could have a conversation with an entirely alien life...

 

[crowbrow]

What if we send some fertilized human eggs alongside their pronouns? Maybe they'll colonize the planet when they get there. Unless they all choose to abort themselves which is their right.

 

[eot]

6.1 times Earth's mass. That's some strong gravity, more than we could stand. Also whilst it's the closest, we still need to travel at the speed of light for 31 years to get there. So it's still pretty far.

Apparently it's a water world.

Yeah. I mean you could literally stand up, but 6 times the Earth's mass would, given the same density, give an effective gravity of 6^(1/3) ≈ 1.8g. That's a lot. It's almost like squatting your body weight every time you walk up a set of stairs.

 

[Super Mario]

But... where are the mountains?

They are underwater because the polar ice caps melted. They used too many plastic straws and had too many rich, whites, guys.

 

[Tesseract]

As are the original founders of freemasonry, and yet they still pollute society today.

freemasons are biggest losers on the planet, trust me dude they ain't controlling shit

 

[eddie4]

another planet for us to destroy with our useless shit, ok.

 

[Trojita]

I can't wait to get swole on that planet.

All DBZ jokes aside, this planet would probably not be livable for humans due to the gravitational force. 4.5 times Earth gravity is probably the limit for a human body. That 4.5g limit is only doable for a small number of top strongman athletes that can walk with a ridiculous number of weight on top of them. At 5g an athlete at that elite level wouldn't be able to stand up. 3 to 4g would be possible for "normal" humans if given the proper training.

For those interested in this information, oddly enough our skeletal structure is completely fine with the stress of high gravity. In fact the human skeleton is theorized to be able to handle more than 90 times Earth gravity. There's a catch with that figure. That's only if someone was simply standing. As soon as the body has to move, the stress on the bones would be increased by a factor of 10! Theoretically if a human had the inhuman muscles required for that gravity, a human could potentially run at 9g without straight up breaking. At 10g (remember 90g was the limit but you have to add the factor of 10 due to stress from skeletal movement) the athlete's bones would start to crack.

This is a research paper on this topic.

 

[Weilthain]

I can't wait to get swole on that planet.

All DBZ jokes aside, this planet would probably not be livable for humans due to the gravitational force. 4.5 times Earth gravity is probably the limit for a human body. That 4.5g limit is only doable for a small number of top strongman athletes that can walk with a ridiculous number of weight on top of them. At 5g an athlete at that elite level wouldn't be able to stand up. 3 to 4g would be possible for "normal" humans if given the proper training.

For those interested in this information, oddly enough our skeletal structure is completely fine with the stress of high gravity. In fact the human skeleton is theorized to be able to handle more than 90 times Earth gravity. There's a catch with that figure. That's only if someone was simply standing. As soon as the body has to move, the stress on the bones would be increased by a factor of 10! Theoretically if a human had the inhuman muscles required for that gravity, a human could potentially run at 9g without straight up breaking. At 10g (remember 90g was the limit but you have to add the factor of 10 due to stress from skeletal movement) the athlete's bones would start to crack.

This is a research paper on this topic.

Gravity isn’t real so don’t worry about it.

 

[Trojita]

Gravity isn’t real so don’t worry about it.

 

[JareBear: Remastered]

Gravity is for pussies