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Oxygen i think is the missing piece. If that's the announcement, that's freaking huge. Oxygen is reactive, it does not exist in any sort of quantity without som

by jfoutz 10y ago

Oxygen i think is the missing piece. If that's the announcement, that's freaking huge. Oxygen is reactive, it does not exist in any sort of quantity without something regularly replenishing it. It wouldn't be unquestionable proof, but very very strong evidence for photosynthesis, so, you know. Life.

colordrops 10y ago
I believe expolanets with oxygen have already been discovered: https://phys.org/news/2016-08-venus-like-exoplanet-oxygen-atmosphere-life.html https://phys.org/news/2016-08-venus-like-exoplanet-oxygen-at...
- jfoutz 10y ago
  You're right, and they've discovered the replenishment mechanism, "the planet is flooded with ultraviolet or UV light. UV light breaks apart water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen" - so no evidence of life. edit Not exactly replenishment, water gets broken up into H and O, some of the H streams off into space, leaving stray Os floating around. In that case everything is just slowly boiling away into space.
  - greeneggs 10y ago
    My understanding of that article (and the associated preprint [1]) is that they have not detected oxygen, but are setting up theoretical models and simulations to account for oxygen that might be detectable in the future. [1] https://arxiv.org/abs/1607.03906 https://arxiv.org/abs/1607.03906
- privong 10y ago
  > I believe expolanets with oxygen have already been discovered: @greeneggs is correct[0], that article is talking about modeling of a hypothetical atmosphere for a given planet. There was not an actual detection of oxygen in the atmosphere. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13700744 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13700744
- dsp1234 10y ago
  We do not know if GJ 1132b has oxygen in it's atmosphere, or even if actually has an atmosphere. Just that it's possible, and that if it does, we'll be able to detect in the future. From the abstract of the Nature paper: "Receiving 19 times more stellar radiation than the Earth, the planet is too hot to be habitable but is cool enough to support a substantial atmosphere, one that has probably been considerably depleted of hydrogen. Because the host star is nearby and only 21 per cent the radius of the Sun, existing and upcoming telescopes will be able to observe the composition and dynamics of the planetary atmosphere." Emphasis on "cool enough to support" (not supports) and "probably been" (not has), and "will be able to observe" (not has observed). http://news.mit.edu/2015/new-earth-sized-exoplanet-1111 http://news.mit.edu/2015/new-earth-sized-exoplanet-1111 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gliese_1132_b https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gliese_1132_b http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v527/n7577/full/nature15762.html http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v527/n7577/full/nature1...

by jfoutz 10y ago

colordrops 10y ago

I believe expolanets with oxygen have already been discovered: https://phys.org/news/2016-08-venus-like-exoplanet-oxygen-atmosphere-life.html https://phys.org/news/2016-08-venus-like-exoplanet-oxygen-at...

jfoutz 10y ago
You're right, and they've discovered the replenishment mechanism, "the planet is flooded with ultraviolet or UV light. UV light breaks apart water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen" - so no evidence of life. edit Not exactly replenishment, water gets broken up into H and O, some of the H streams off into space, leaving stray Os floating around. In that case everything is just slowly boiling away into space.
- greeneggs 10y ago
  My understanding of that article (and the associated preprint [1]) is that they have not detected oxygen, but are setting up theoretical models and simulations to account for oxygen that might be detectable in the future. [1] https://arxiv.org/abs/1607.03906 https://arxiv.org/abs/1607.03906
privong 10y ago
> I believe expolanets with oxygen have already been discovered: @greeneggs is correct[0], that article is talking about modeling of a hypothetical atmosphere for a given planet. There was not an actual detection of oxygen in the atmosphere. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13700744 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13700744
dsp1234 10y ago
We do not know if GJ 1132b has oxygen in it's atmosphere, or even if actually has an atmosphere. Just that it's possible, and that if it does, we'll be able to detect in the future. From the abstract of the Nature paper: "Receiving 19 times more stellar radiation than the Earth, the planet is too hot to be habitable but is cool enough to support a substantial atmosphere, one that has probably been considerably depleted of hydrogen. Because the host star is nearby and only 21 per cent the radius of the Sun, existing and upcoming telescopes will be able to observe the composition and dynamics of the planetary atmosphere." Emphasis on "cool enough to support" (not supports) and "probably been" (not has), and "will be able to observe" (not has observed). http://news.mit.edu/2015/new-earth-sized-exoplanet-1111 http://news.mit.edu/2015/new-earth-sized-exoplanet-1111 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gliese_1132_b https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gliese_1132_b http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v527/n7577/full/nature15762.html http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v527/n7577/full/nature1...