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Space News Update — August 26, 2016 —

Contents

In the News

Story 1: Jupiter's Extended Family? A Billion or More

Story 2: SpaceX Dragon Splashes Down with Crucial NASA Research Samples

Story 3: Astronomers Discover Dark Matter Galaxy, by Accident

Departments

The Night Sky

ISS Sighting Opportunities

Space Calendar

NASA-TV Highlights

Food for Thought

Space Image of the Week

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1. Jupiter's Extended Family? A Billion or More

Our galaxy is home to a bewildering variety of Jupiter-like worlds: hot ones, cold ones, giant versions of our own giant, pint-sized pretenders only half as big around.

Astronomers say that in our galaxy alone, a billion or more such Jupiter-like worlds could be orbiting stars other than our sun. And we can use them to gain a better understanding of our solar system and our galactic environment, including the prospects for finding life.

It turns out the inverse is also true -- we can turn our instruments and probes to our own backyard, and view Jupiter as if it were an exoplanet to learn more about those far-off worlds. The best-ever chance to do this is now, with Juno, a NASA probe the size of a basketball court, which arrived at Jupiter in July to begin a series of long, looping orbits around our solar system's largest planet. Juno is expected to capture the most detailed images of the gas giant ever seen. And with a suite of science instruments, Juno will plumb the secrets beneath Jupiter's roiling atmosphere.

It will be a very long time, if ever, before scientists who study exoplanets -- planets orbiting other stars -- get the chance to watch an interstellar probe coast into orbit around an exo-Jupiter, dozens or hundreds of light-years away. But if they ever do, it's a safe bet the scene will summon echoes of Juno.

"The only way we're going to ever be able to understand what we see in those extrasolar planets is by actually understanding our system, our Jupiter itself," said David Ciardi, an astronomer with NASA's Exoplanet Science Institute (NExSci) at Caltech.

Not all Jupiters are created equal

Juno's detailed examination of Jupiter could provide insights into the history, and future, of our solar system. The tally of confirmed exoplanets so far includes hundreds in Jupiter's size-range, and many more that are larger or smaller.

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The so-called hot Jupiters acquired their name for a reason: They are in tight orbits around their stars that make them sizzling-hot, completing a full revolution -- the planet's entire year -- in what would be a few days on Earth. And they're charbroiled along the way.

But why does our solar system lack a "hot Jupiter?" Or is this, perhaps, the fate awaiting our own Jupiter billions of years from now -- could it gradually spiral toward the sun, or might the swollen future sun expand to engulf it? Not likely, Ciardi says; such planetary migrations probably occur early in the life of a solar system.

"In order for migration to occur, there needs to be dusty material within the system," he said. "Enough to produce drag. That phase of migration is long since over for our solar system." Jupiter itself might already have migrated from farther out in the solar system, although no one really knows, he said.

Looking back in time

If Juno's measurements can help settle the question, they could take us a long way toward understanding Jupiter's influence on the formation of Earth -- and, by extension, the formation of other "Earths" that might be scattered among the stars. "Juno is measuring water vapor in the Jovian atmosphere," said Elisa Quintana, a research scientist at the NASA Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California. "This allows the mission to measure the abundance of oxygen on Jupiter. Oxygen is thought to be correlated with the initial position from which Jupiter originated."

If Jupiter's formation started with large chunks of ice in its present position, then it would have taken a lot of water ice to carry in the heavier elements which we find in Jupiter. But a Jupiter that formed farther out in the solar system, then migrated inward, could have formed from much colder ice, which would carry in the observed heavier elements with a smaller amount of water. If Jupiter formed more directly from the solar nebula, without ice chunks as a starter, then it should contain less water still. Measuring the water is a key step in understanding how and where Jupiter formed.

That's how Juno's microwave radiometer, which will measure water vapor, could reveal Jupiter's ancient history. "If Juno detects a high abundance of oxygen, it could suggest that the planet formed farther out," Quintana said.

A probe dropped into Jupiter by NASA’s Galileo spacecraft in 1995 found high winds and turbulence, but the expected water seemed to be absent. Scientists think Galileo's one-shot probe just happened to drop into a dry area of the atmosphere, but Juno will survey the entire planet from orbit.

The chaotic early years

Where Jupiter formed, and when, also could answer questions about the solar system's "giant impact phase," a time of crashes and collisions among early planet-forming bodies that eventually led to the solar system we have today.

Our solar system was extremely accident-prone in its early history -- perhaps not quite like billiard balls caroming around, but with plenty of pileups and fender-benders. "It definitely was a violent time," Quintana said. "There were collisions going on for tens of millions of years. For example, the idea of how the moon formed is that a proto-Earth and another body collided; the disk of debris from this collision formed the moon. And some people think Mercury, because it has such a huge iron core, was hit by something big that stripped off its mantle; it was left with a large core in proportion to its size."

Part of Quintana's research involves computer modeling of the formation of planets and solar systems. Teasing out Jupiter's structure and composition could greatly enhance such models, she said. Quintana already has modeled our solar system's formation, with Jupiter and without, yielding some surprising findings.

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"For a long time, people thought Jupiter was essential to habitability because it might have shielded Earth from the constant influx of impacts [during the solar system's early days] which could have been damaging to habitability," she said. "What we've found in our simulations is that it's almost the opposite. When you add Jupiter, the accretion times are faster and the impacts onto Earth are far more energetic. Planets formed within about 100 million years; the solar system was done growing by that point," Quintana said.

"If you take Jupiter out, you still form Earth, but on timescales of billions of years rather than hundreds of millions. Earth still receives giant impacts, but they're less frequent and have lower impact energies," she said.

Getting to the core

Another critical Juno measurement that could shed new light on the dark history of planetary formation is the mission's gravity science experiment. Changes in the frequency of radio transmissions from Juno to NASA's Deep Space Network will help map the giant planet's gravitational field. Knowing the nature of Jupiter's core could reveal how quickly the planet formed, with implications for how Jupiter might have affected Earth's formation.

And the spacecraft's magnetometers could yield more insight into the deep internal structure of Jupiter by measuring its magnetic field. "We don't understand a lot about Jupiter's magnetic field," Ciardi said. "We think it's produced by metallic hydrogen in the deep interior. Jupiter has an incredibly strong magnetic field, much stronger than Earth's."

Mapping Jupiter's magnetic field also might help pin down the plausibility of proposed scenarios for alien life beyond our solar system. Earth's magnetic field is thought to be important to life because it acts like a protective shield, channeling potentially harmful charged particles and cosmic rays away from the surface. "If a Jupiter-like planet orbits its star at a distance where liquid water could exist, the Jupiter-like planet itself might not have life, but it might have moons which could potentially harbor life," he said.

An exo-Jupiter’s intense magnetic field could protect such life forms, he said. That conjures visions of Pandora, the moon in the movie "Avatar" inhabited by 10-foot-tall humanoids who ride massive, flying predators through an exotic alien ecosystem.

Juno's findings will be important not only to understanding how exo-Jupiters might influence the formation of exo-Earths, or other kinds of habitable planets. They'll also be essential to the next generation of space telescopes that will hunt for alien worlds. The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) will conduct a survey of nearby bright stars for exoplanets beginning in June 2018, or earlier. The James Webb Space Telescope, expected to launch in 2018, and WFIRST (Wide-Field Infrared Survey Telescope), with launch anticipated in the mid-2020s, will attempt to take direct images of giant planets orbiting other stars.

"We're going to be able to image planets and get spectra," or light profiles from exoplanets that will reveal atmospheric gases, Ciardi said. Juno's revelations about Jupiter will help scientists to make sense of these data from distant worlds.

"Studying our solar system is about studying exoplanets," he said. "And studying exoplanets is about studying our solar system. They go together."

To learn more about a few of the known exo-Jupiters, visit:

https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/alien-worlds/strange-new-worlds

Source: NASA Return to Contents

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2. SpaceX Dragon Splashes Down with Crucial NASA Research Samples

SpaceX's Dragon cargo spacecraft splashed down in the Pacific Ocean at 11:47 a.m. EDT Friday, Aug. 26, southwest of Baja California with more than 3,000 pounds of NASA cargo, science and technology demonstration samples from the International Space Station.

The Dragon spacecraft will be taken by ship to a port near Los Angeles, where some cargo will be removed and returned to NASA immediately. Dragon then will be prepared for a return trip to SpaceX's test facility in McGregor, Texas, for processing.

When it arrived at the station July 20, Dragon delivered the first of two international docking adapters (IDAs) in its external cargo hold, or “trunk.” The IDAs will be used by commercial spacecraft now in development for transporting astronauts to the station as part of NASA's Commercial Crew Program. The initial adapter was installed during an Aug. 19 spacewalk by Expedition 48 Commander Jeff Williams and Flight Engineer Kate Rubins of NASA. The second adapter is being built and will be delivered on a future Dragon cargo resupply mission.

Among the experiment samples returning Friday are those from the Heart Cells study, which is looking at how microgravity affects human heart cells. The U.S. National Laboratory investigation is studying how microgravity changes the human heart, and how those changes vary between individuals. Deep space missions including the journey to Mars will require long periods of space travel, which creates increased risk of health problems such as muscle atrophy, including possible atrophy of the heart muscle. Heart cells cultured aboard the space station for one month will be analyzed for cellular and molecular changes. Results could advance the study of heart disease and the development of drugs and cell replacement therapy.

Samples will also be returned from two rodent-based investigations, the Mouse Epigenetics and Rodent Research-3-Eli Lilly experiments. The mouse model is useful for showing how much shorter stays by mice in the low-Earth environment can be used to infer how similar conditions may affect future human exploration.

In Mouse Epigenetics, researchers are exploring altered gene expression and DNA by tracking changes in the organs of male mice that spend one month in space, and examining changes in the DNA of their offspring. In Rodent Research-3-Eli Lilly, scientists are looking at rapid loss of bone and muscle mass in the legs and spine, and comparing it to what is experienced by people with muscle wasting diseases or with limited mobility on Earth and testing an antibody known to prevent muscle wasting in mice on Earth. This U.S. National

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Laboratory experiment is sponsored by pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly and Co. and the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space.

Also returning are samples from the Multi-Omics experiment. This research is analyzing the composition of microbes in the human digestive system and how they may affect the human immune system. Researchers may be able to identify bacterial or metabolic biomarkers that could be useful for astronaut health management, and therefore future human exploration of the solar system.

Dragon is currently the only space station resupply spacecraft able to return a significant amount of cargo to Earth. The spacecraft lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida July 18 carrying almost 5,000 pounds of supplies and scientific cargo on the company’s ninth commercial resupply mission to the station.

The International Space Station is a convergence of science, technology and human innovation that demonstrates new technologies and makes research breakthroughs not possible on Earth. The space station has been occupied continuously since November 2000. In that time, more than 200 people and a variety of international and commercial spacecraft have visited the orbiting laboratory. The space station remains the springboard to NASA's next great leap in human space exploration, including the journey to Mars.

Get more information about SpaceX's mission to the International Space Station at http://www.nasa.gov/spacex.

Find more information about the International Space Station, its crews and their research at http://www.nasa.gov/station.

Source: NASA Return to Contents

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3. Astronomers Discover Dark Matter Galaxy, by Accident

Sometimes, a flaw in your magnifying glass can be a good thing; in the case of some new research, it can even reveal invisible dark matter galaxies.

Astronomers probing the sky used the gravity of a massive galaxy as a natural magnifying glass, and they found a strange distortion on its edge. That distortion proved to be a smaller, invisible galaxy composed of dark matter. The discovery, explained in a new video, could pave the way to finding more of these unusual objects, providing a better understanding of the mysterious material that makes up most of the matter in the universe.

"We can find these invisible objects in the same way that you can see rain droplets on a window," lead author Yashar Hezaveh said in a statement. Like raindrops, the massive clumps of matter warp objects seen through them. Hezaveh, an astronomer at Stanford University in California, worked with a team of scientists that used a massive radio telescope, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, to find a clump of missing matter in the outer rim of a larger galaxy that.

"You know they are there because they distort the image of the background objects," Hezaveh said.

Observing objects in the distant universe can challenge the limits of current technology. As a shortcut, astronomers can rely on a much older tool: massive galaxies large enough to distort space-time. As predicted by Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity, the enormous collections of stars serve as magnifying glasses by causing light to bend as it passes by. The distant light curves around the nearer galaxy, creating a so-called "Einstein ring." This reveals faraway objects behind the nearby galaxy.

Scientists take advantage of the gravitational to study incredibly distant galaxies, many of which formed only a few billion years after the universe's Big Bang.

The team of astronomers noticed that the newly updated ALMA's image of an Einstein ring known as SDP.81 contained a strange distortion, unveiled only after thousands of computers working together searched for subtle anomalies. The unprecedented detail of the star-free region around the closer lensing galaxy, known as the halo, revealed a distinctive clump of matter less than one-thousandth the mass of the Milky Way. This

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clump's location and mass, and the fact that no object could be spotted in the region suggested that the cluster could be an extremely faint dwarf galaxy of dark matter lying nearly 4 billion light-years from Earth.

Dark matter makes up more than three-fourths of the matter in the universe, but cannot be seen via visible light or electromagnetic radiation. Instead, scientists must use distortions produced by dark matter's gravity to detect the material.

In the case of galaxies, smaller dark-matter clusters could help astronomers solve a long-standing puzzle. Theory predicts that most galaxies should host dwarf galaxies in their halos, but few of these smaller galaxies have been spotted. Only about 40 of the predicted thousands of such galaxies have been seen orbiting the Milky Way.

"This discrepancy between observed satellites and predicted abundances has been a major problem in cosmology for nearly two decades, even called a 'crisis' by some researchers," said team member Neal Dalal, of the University of Illinois.

"If these dwarf objects are dominated by dark matter, this could explain the discrepancy while offering new insights into the true nature of dark matter," he said.

According to the researchers, ALMA may bring more of these dark matter satellites to light. With its incredible sensitivity, the enormous array of instruments could pinpoint other invisible dwarf galaxies hovering around the edges of natural magnifying glasses throughout the universe.

"This is an amazing demonstration of the power of ALMA," said team member Gilbert Holder, of McGill University in Canada. "We are now confident that ALMA can efficiently discover these dwarf galaxies.

Source: CBS News Return to Contents

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The Night Sky Friday, August 26

• Venus and Jupiter have closed to only 1° apart, very low in the west after sunset. That's less than a finger-width at arm's length. See tomorrow's entry.

Saturday, August 27

• Venus-Jupiter conjunction. Starting about 20 minutes after sunset, look low above the horizon due west, left of where the Sun went down. Bring binoculars. The two planets will be less than ½° apart at the time of twilight for most of the world, and only about 0.1° apart for the longitudes of the Americas. That's so close that you may need the binoculars to see that they are two objects, not one!

And you might try for much fainter Mercury, 5° to their lower left in bright twilight (for North America). Good luck; Mercury has faded down to magnitude +0.8.

Sunday, August 28

• You can tell that summer's days are numbered: when darkness falls, Cassiopeia has risen about as high in the northeast as the Big Dipper has declined in the northwest.

• Also, with August nearing its end, you can say hello to the Double Cluster in Perseus without having to stay up late. After dark, find the tilted W of Cassiopeia partway up the northeastern sky. Note the two stars of its lower-left segment (the faint end of the W). Using binoculars, aim at the midpoint between them and then drop down by a little more than the full width of the binocular's view (for typical binoculars). Look for two little irregular cotton puffs, touching each other and tilted diagonally.

With a dark enough sky you can even make them out with the unaided eye, as a distinct enhancement of the background Milky Way.

Monday, August 29

• Crisp nights of late summer are prime Milky Way time, as hot-weather humid hazes give way to dryer, clearer air (at least where a lot of us live). After dark, the Milky Way runs from Sagittarius in the south, up and left across Aquila, through the big Summer Triangle very high in the east, and on down through Cassiopeia to Perseus rising low in the north-northeast.

Source: Sky & Telescope Return to Contents

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ISS Sighting Opportunities

For Denver: No sightings possible Sighting information for other cities can be found at NASA’s Satellite Sighting Information

NASA-TV Highlights (all times Eastern Daylight Time)

Saturday, August 27

7 a.m., 11 p.m., Replay of Space Station Live (8/25/16) (all channels)

2 p.m., 8 p.m., Replay of the ISS Expedition 48 U.S. Spacewalk #37 Preview Briefing (all channels)

Sunday, August 28

7 a.m., 11 p.m., Replay of Space Station Live (8/25/16) (all channels)

10 a.m., 6 p.m., Replay of the ISS Expedition 48 U.S. Spacewalk #37 Preview Briefing (all channels)

Monday, August 29

3:30 p.m., 7:30 p.m., NASA TV Video B-Roll Feed of ISS Expedition 50-51 Crew (Whitson, Pesquet, Novitskiy) Training and Past Missions (all channels)

4 p.m., 8 p.m., 10 p.m., Monday, August 29 - Replay of the ISS Expedition 50-51 Crew News Conference (Whitson, Pesquet, Novitskiy) (all channels)

Watch NASA TV on the Net by going to the NASA website. Return to Contents

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Space Calendar • Aug 26 - [Aug 26] Dragon Supply Ship Return to Earth (International Space Station) • Aug 26 - Amor Asteroid 433 Eros Closest Approach To Earth (0.725 AU) • Aug 26 - Asteroid 2281 Biela Closest Approach To Earth (0.877 AU) • Aug 26 - Atira Asteroid 2007 EB26 Closest Approach To Earth (0.882 AU) • Aug 26 - Asteroid 149 Medusa Closest Approach To Earth (1.128 AU) • Aug 26 - Asteroid 19019 Sunflower Closest Approach To Earth (1.223 AU) • Aug 26 - Asteroid 2451 Dollfus Closest Approach To Earth (1.376 AU) • Aug 26 - Asteroid 7554 Johnspencer Closest Approach To Earth (2.950 AU) • Aug 26 - Kuiper Belt Object 225088 (2007 OR10) At Opposition (86.592 AU) • Aug 26 - 35th Anniversary (1981), Voyager 2, Saturn Flyby • Aug 27 - Mercury Passes 5.3 Degrees From Venus • Aug 27 - Venus Passes 0.1 Degrees From Jupiter • Aug 27 - Comet C/2015 TQ209 (LINEAR) Perihelion (1.413 AU) • Aug 27 - Comet C/2015 V4 (PANSTARRS) Perihelion (5.460 AU) • Aug 27 - Amor Asteroid 2016 OM1 Near-Earth Flyby (0.088 AU) • Aug 27 - Asteroid 11947 Kimclijsters Closest Approach To Earth (1.551 AU) • Aug 27 - Asteroid 1762 Russell Closest Approach To Earth (1.745 AU) • Aug 27 - Asteroid 18235 Lynden-Bell Closest Approach To Earth (2.463 AU) • Aug 27 - Centaur Object 7066 Nessus At Opposition (26.173 AU) • Aug 27 - Kuiper Belt Object 307982 (2004 PG115) At Opposition (36.953 AU) • Aug 28 - Insat 3DR GSLV Launch • Aug 28 - Comet 93P/Lovas At Opposition (1.460 AU) • Aug 28 - Comet 139P/Vaisala-Oterma At Opposition (2.969 AU) • Aug 28 - Comet 159P/LONEOS At Opposition (3.957 AU) • Aug 28 - Asteroid 14220 Alexgibbs Closest Approach To Earth (1.465 AU) • Aug 28 - Asteroid 10378 Ingmarbergman Closest Approach To Earth (1.830 AU) • Aug 28 - Asteroid 204852 Frankfurt Closest Approach To Earth (1.866 AU) • Aug 28 - Asteroid 19482 Harperlee Closest Approach To Earth (1.932 AU) • Aug 29 - Comet 176P/LINEAR Closest Approach To Earth (1.723 AU) • Aug 29 - Comet P/2015 M2 (PANSTARRS) Closest Approach To Earth (5.007 AU) • Aug 29 - Apollo Asteroid 2016 PA40 Near-Earth Flyby (0.037 AU) • Aug 29 - Asteroid 118401 LINEAR Closest Approach To Earth (1.723 AU) • Aug 29 - Asteroid 8721 AMOS Closest Approach To Earth (2.788 AU) • Aug 29 - Johann Holetschek's 160th Birthday (1846)

Source: JPL Space Calendar Return to Contents

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Food for Thought

ESO Discovers Earth-Size Planet in Habitable Zone of Nearest Star

A newly discovered, roughly Earth-sized planet orbiting our nearest neighboring star might be habitable, according to a team of astronomers using the European Southern Observatory's 3.6-meter telescope at La Silla, Chile, along with other telescopes around the world.

The exoplanet is at a distance from its star that allows temperatures mild enough for liquid water to pool on its surface.

"NASA congratulates ESO on the discovery of this intriguing planet that has captured the hopes and the imagination of the world," says Paul Hertz, Astrophysics Division Director at NASA Headquarters, Washington. "We look forward to learning more about the planet, whether it holds ingredients that could make it suitable for life."

The new planet circles Proxima Centauri, the smallest member of a triple star system known to science fiction fans everywhere as Alpha Centauri. Just over 4 light-years away, Proxima is the closest star to Earth, besides our own sun.

"This is really a game-changer in our field," said Olivier Guyon, a planet-hunting affiliate at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, and associate professor at the University of Arizona, Tucson. "The closest star to us has a possible rocky planet in the habitable zone. That's a huge deal. It also boosts the already existing, mounting body of evidence that such planets are near, and that several of them are probably sitting quite close to us. This is extremely exciting."

The science team that made the discovery, led by Guillem Anglada-Escudé of Queen Mary University of London, will publish its findings Aug. 25 in the journal Nature. The team traced subtle wobbles in the star revealing, the presence of a star-tugging planet.

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They determined that the new planet, dubbed Proxima b, is at least 1.3 times the mass of Earth. It orbits its star far more closely than Mercury orbits our sun, taking only 11 days to complete a single orbit -- a "year" on Proxima b.

Long list of unknowns

The stunning announcement comes with plenty of caveats. While the new planet lies within its star's "habitable zone" -- a distance at which temperatures are right for liquid water -- scientists do not yet know if the planet has an atmosphere.

It also orbits a red-dwarf star, far smaller and cooler than our sun. The planet likely presents only one face to its star, as the moon does to Earth, instead of rotating through our familiar days and nights. And Proxima b could be subject to potentially life-extinguishing stellar flares.

"That's the worry in terms of habitability," said Scott Gaudi, an astronomy professor at Ohio State University, Columbus, and JPL affiliate credited with numerous exoplanet discoveries. "This thing is being bombarded by a fair amount of high-energy radiation. It's not obvious if it's going to have a magnetic field strong enough to prevent its whole atmosphere from getting blown away. But those are really hard calculations, and I certainly wouldn't put my money either way on that."

Despite the unknowns, the discovery was hailed by NASA exoplanet hunters as a major milestone on the road to finding other possible life-bearing worlds within our stellar neighborhood.

"It definitely gives us something to be excited about," said Sara Seager, a planetary science and physics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, and an exoplanet-hunting pioneer. "I think it will definitely motivate people to get moving."

'Not completely unexpected'

Statistical surveys of exoplanets -- planets orbiting other stars -- by NASA's Kepler space telescope have revealed a large proportion of small planets around small stars, she said.

The Kepler data suggest we should expect at least one potentially habitable, Earth-size planet orbiting M-type stars, like Proxima, within 10 light-years of our solar system.

So the latest discovery was "not completely unexpected. We're more lucky than surprised," Seager said. But it "helps buoy our confidence that planets are everywhere."

It's especially encouraging for upcoming space telescopes, which can contribute to the study of the new planet. The James Webb Space Telescope, launching in 2018, may be able to follow-up on this planet with spectroscopy to determine the contents of its atmosphere. NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) will find similar planets in the habitable zone in the stellar backyard of our solar system in 2018.

One of TESS's goals is to find planets orbiting nearby M-dwarf stars like Proxima Centauri.

"It's great news just to know that M-dwarf planets could be as common as we think they are," Seager said.

Another possible inspiration Proxima b could reignite: the admittedly far-off goal of sending a probe to another solar system.

Bill Borucki, an exoplanet pioneer, said the new discovery might inspire more interstellar research, especially if Proxima b proves to have an atmosphere.

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Coming generations of space and ground-based telescopes, including large ground telescopes now under construction, could yield more information about the planet, perhaps inspiring ideas on how to pay it a visit.

"It may be that the first time we get really good information is from the newer telescopes that may be coming online in a decade or two," said Borucki, now retired, the former principal investigator for Kepler, which has discovered the bulk of the more than 3,300 exoplanets found so far.

"Maybe people will talk about sending a probe to that star system," Borucki said. "I think it does provide some inspiration for an interstellar mission, because now we know there is a planet in the habitable zone, probably around the mass of Earth, around the closest star. I think it does inspire a future effort to go there and check it out."

To read the ESO press release, visit www.eso.org/public/news/eso1629/?lang.

To learn more about NASA's Exoplanet Program, visit http://exoplanets.nasa.gov

Source: NASA Return to Contents

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Space Image of the Week

Curiosity at Murray Buttes on Mars

Explanation: What are these unusual lumps on Mars? As NASA's robotic Curiosity rover continues rolling across Mars, it is now approaching Murray Buttes. Several of the 15-meter high buttes are visible ahead in this horizontally compressed 360-degree across image taken inside Gale Crater earlier this month. The buttes are thought similar to Earth buttes in that they are capped with dense rock that is relatively resistant to erosion. In the image center is Curiosity's "arm" and "hand" used to examine rocks up close, drill into rocks, and collect samples. Curiosity has reached its four year anniversary on Mars and has been cleared to spend the next two years further exploring the slopes of Mount Sharp, the peak of which is the distant light-colored structure visible on the far left. Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS

Source: Astronomy Picture of the Day Return to Contents