Scientist earmarks planets most likely to hold alien life
Steve Connor
Independent
_________
Astronomers have identified a star in our Milky Way galaxy that is the most likely candidate for possessing a companion planet that harbours intelligent extra-terrestrial life.
It is a sun-like star called beta CVn in the constellation Canes Venatici and it appears to possess all the necessary preconditions that would allow an advanced civilisation to flourish on a nearby planet.
The star is 26 light years away - 153 trillion miles - and it heads a shortlist of five stars that astronomer Margaret Turnbull of the Carnegie Institution in Washington believes could be the focus of fresh attempts to make contact with other intelligent beings.Dr Turnbull selected her top five from an initial catalogue of 17,129 stars that could be "habitable stellar systems" where the physical conditions would not be too extreme to limit the evolution and development of intelligent life and its technology.The other four stars that may have planets with advanced life:
* HD 10307, another solar analogue about 42 light years away.
* HD 211415, about half the metal content of Sun and a bit cooler, this star is just a little farther away than HD 10307.
* 18 Sco, a popular target for proposed planet searches.
*51 Pegasus. Already famous.
feb 20, 2006
Steve Connor
Independent
_________
Astronomers have identified a star in our Milky Way galaxy that is the most likely candidate for possessing a companion planet that harbours intelligent extra-terrestrial life.
It is a sun-like star called beta CVn in the constellation Canes Venatici and it appears to possess all the necessary preconditions that would allow an advanced civilisation to flourish on a nearby planet.
The star is 26 light years away - 153 trillion miles - and it heads a shortlist of five stars that astronomer Margaret Turnbull of the Carnegie Institution in Washington believes could be the focus of fresh attempts to make contact with other intelligent beings.Dr Turnbull selected her top five from an initial catalogue of 17,129 stars that could be "habitable stellar systems" where the physical conditions would not be too extreme to limit the evolution and development of intelligent life and its technology.The other four stars that may have planets with advanced life:
* HD 10307, another solar analogue about 42 light years away.
* HD 211415, about half the metal content of Sun and a bit cooler, this star is just a little farther away than HD 10307.
* 18 Sco, a popular target for proposed planet searches.
*51 Pegasus. Already famous.
feb 20, 2006
