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If Hycean Worlds Really Exist, What are Their Oceans Like?
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This article describes a measurement that says that Trappist-b is not habitable for non-human life.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technolo … r-BB1kSuYx
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However, TRAPPIST-1 b, is the innermost planet and receives about four times the amount of energy that Earth gets from the Sun.
The indication is, no atmosphere. Which is not that surprising as it gets about twice the amount of solar radiation as Venus does.
The planet may resemble a larger version of Mercury, perhaps.
But I would hope that it was actually tidal locked. In that case perhaps ~40% of its surface might be in a rather permanent deep cold.
Such a world might harbor glaciation in the darkness, and under sufficient ice, perhaps even liquid water. Ice shell worlds we think exist such as Europa may have this in common with it. So, that actually that world might harbor life, if Trappist-b has volcanism under the ice. This is of course a "Maybe". It may have tidal heating due to the 6 other known planets and its star.
Such a world might be attractive to humans or similar beings, should they be able to travel to it. But I believe it is 40 light years away.
Other people look at Proxima Centauri-b and see a world that is just a bit larger than Earth. On a bet, my money would be that it does not have an atmosphere either.
I would be more interested in Proxima Centauri-d, which is closer to the star, and about 2 times the mass of Mars, I believe.
That world without an atmosphere, and tidal locked may have a hot sunward side, dry, and a cold darker side with ices. A technological society might do quite a bit with that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxima_Centauri_d
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Proxima d is a sub-Earth at least one-quarter of the mass of Earth (or twice the mass of Mars), orbiting at roughly 0.029 AU (4.3 million km; 2.7 million mi) every 5.1 days.[2] It is the least massive and innermost known planet of the Proxima Centauri system. It is the least massive exoplanet detected with the radial velocity method as of 2022. Although Proxima d orbits too close to its star to have a habitable equilibrium temperature (which likely reaches 360 K (87 °C; 188 °F)[1] from about 190% of Earth's irradiation—assuming an Earth-like reflectivity, it is theoretically possible that Proxima d possesses polar regions with habitable temperatures.
But it could resemble Mercury and not be tidal locked, in which case it may have shadowed craters at its poles, with ices in them.
That world is perhaps the closest extra solar planet to us, accessible with our imagined technical abilities. It would have lots of energy, solar, and maybe geothermal. And if it did have ices in the cold places, might be quite a planet to set up camp on.
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Last edited by Void (2024-04-01 08:00:18)
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Although the planet described here may be at most marginally habitable, it does seem to be evidence that tidal locked planets can exist.
https://phys.org/news/2024-04-tidally-s … lanet.html
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First tidally locked super-Earth exoplanet confirmed
by Bob Yirka , Phys.org
I take encouragement from that. I have had further thoughts about tidal locked planets, with a lack of atmosphere. Those and Rogue Worlds as well.
The science and also the media communities seem to be obsessed about discovering life and even aliens with skill levels greater or less than ours. I don't tend to be that way. If it turns out to exist then it has to be processed by our culture, if they don't kill us.
It appears that Fusion is eventually going to become a real thing as per power plant potential. That and Orion Type Drives says that eventually, if the human race is able to avoid severe mass insanity, humans and their machines may go to interstellar planets, such as Rogues, and Tidal Locked ones. These are unlikely to have fostered competitive aliens. I consider that to be a good thing.
So, with the proper tools some of these worlds can be refashioned to a suitable use for humans and their machines.
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As for around Red Dwarfs, we might want to hope to find a Titan orbiting a Saturn. With a very cold Nitrogen atmosphere, and perhaps protected by a magnetic field from the parent planet as Saturn protects Titan. Having an energy source, a lot could be done with something like that.
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Last edited by Void (2024-04-03 10:44:26)
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NASA's planet-hunter TESS temporarily shuts off
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Materials in this post suggest that solar wind does not strip atmosphere as much as was thought, in the cases of Venus and perhaps Mars:
https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 58#p221758
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The idea of a magnetic field for Mars has been an exciting one, but recent information suggests that it is not needed.
https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 05#p221605
If you go to minute 8.06 of this video it is suggested that the losses have not been that much: https://www.patreon.com/posts/interstel … -102029505
It is said that over 3.9 billion years they calculate that Venus would have lost .02 to .6 meters of water to the solar wind. And they think that Mars is somewhat the same.
I am willing to say that it is not certain how much good a magnetic field might do.
This will be interesting for Red Dwarf worlds as well. They may have greater power to hold an atmosphere than has been thought.
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Perhaps it will be discovered that a Red Dwarf might make some planets more Earthlike by stripping away a Hycean original atmosphere, and yet perhaps allowing a secondary atmosphere.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hycean_planet
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Last edited by Void (2024-04-13 11:09:37)
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In search for alien life, purple may be the new green
https://phys.org/news/2024-04-alien-lif … green.html
Instead of green, many such bacteria on Earth contain purple pigments, and purple worlds on which they are dominant would produce a distinctive "light fingerprint" detectable by next-generation ground- and space-based telescopes, Cornell scientists report in new research
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Kepler part 2 is 'Made in China?
China Is Hatching a Plan to Find Earth 2.0
https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti … earth-2-0/
A satellite will scour the Milky Way for exoplanets orbiting stars just like the sun
The Earth 2.0 satellite is designed to carry seven telescopes that will observe the sky for four years. Six of the telescopes will work together to survey the Cygnus–Lyra constellations, the same patch of sky that the Kepler telescope scoured. “The Kepler field is a low-hanging fruit, because we have very good data from there,” says Jian Ge, the astronomer leading the Earth 2.0 mission at the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
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Marvel at the Variety of Planets Found by TESS Already
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NASA's Webb Telescope Observes Potentially Habitable Exoplanets
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This has been on the internet for a while: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technolo … r-BB1pS6mN Quote:
Scientists Have Discovered a Habitable Eyeball in Space
Story by Darren Orf • 3d • 4 min read
I suppose it is more likely that the planet is not as hospitable as discussed. Even so, I have in the past considered what the biosphere of such a world could be like.
My first guess is that weather would be in the form of an oscillation. I believe that Antarctica can be like that.
The differential temperature between the sunny side of the planet and the dark side of the planet would build up, until a storm broke loose. Then a storm would sweep from the dark side with very cold winds. The temperatures would then equalize enough to still the winds.
If there were a shoreline of iceshelf, sometimes icebergs would break from it, perhaps in the still time the icebergs would travel back to the shore.
Supposing that there were nutrients in the water then perhaps multicellular life could exist. Fish like perhaps, and some of those could develop the ability to fly. And there might be penguin like creatures, seal like creatures. That would perhaps mean guano on the beaches which could lead to bogs and bog covered ice shelf.
Technological materials could be bone and shell, perhaps rocks from space, maybe the way to light a fire with those, and then fire would need to be of oil from killed animals I expect. But it might also be possible that some sort of tree could grow in the bogs.
But the gravity of the planet is likely so large that it would be very hard to get into space without some sort of method we do not know of.
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Last edited by Void (2024-07-16 07:44:33)
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There is really no way of knowing at present whether this planet is habitable or not. It appears to have about the right solar flux and isn't too big.
It actually makes relatively little difference from a human colonisation viewpoint if there are no other habitable planets in the galaxy. By the time we get that far, we will be living in space. More habitable planets simply means more competition. From a purely human viewpoint, a paucity of habitable worlds may be a positive outcome. A Mars-like world or even a Ganymede would be perfectly useful to future humanity.
Last edited by Calliban (2024-07-16 10:24:11)
"Plan and prepare for every possibility, and you will never act. It is nobler to have courage as we stumble into half the things we fear than to analyse every possible obstacle and begin nothing. Great things are achieved by embracing great dangers."
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Finding large numbers of planets with life would not be reassuring if you're worried about the "Great Filter". If Earth turns out to be an incredibly rare type of world, that's good news from a Fermi "Paradox" perspective.
Metaphysically I believe us to be alone. Our job is to no longer be alone. "Now no shrub of the field was yet on the earth, and no plant of the field had yet sprouted, for the LORD God had not sent rain upon the earth, and there was no man to cultivate the ground."
Use what is abundant and build to last
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Earth does appear to be quite rare. Most of the several thousand planets discovered so far appear to be larger than Earth and this doesn't appear to be detection bias. And most star systems mapped so far have much tighter orbits than the solar system. It is looking more likely that the Earth is unusual. That may be disappointing to SETI enthusiasts. But it probably means we don't have to worry about the Trisolarian fleet. And it is entirely possible that we are the only extant technological civilisation in the galaxy. That is in some ways daunting. But it does allow for practically unlimited expansion without conflict.
Technology extends the limits of habitability. None of the other worlds in our solar system appears to have been capable of developing an extensive ecosystem naturally. But technology would appear to allow Mars to be terraformed. With fusion based energy, the larger icy moons could be given breathable atmospheres over a long timescale and could probably support tundra ecosystems. Smaller icy bodies could be aquaformed. I am quite confident that humanity will ultimately spread life throughout the galaxy. With technology, we are not limited to those rare Class-M oases of life, like we see in Star Trek. The icy dwarf planets, comets and interstellar rogue bodies are within our reach as well.
Last edited by Calliban (2024-07-16 17:22:19)
"Plan and prepare for every possibility, and you will never act. It is nobler to have courage as we stumble into half the things we fear than to analyse every possible obstacle and begin nothing. Great things are achieved by embracing great dangers."
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