Narrowing the search for alien life
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.029616
Nature : Since its launch in 2009, NASA’s Kepler spacecraft has discovered more than 1000 exoplanets by looking for the dip in brightness as they pass in front of their star. To search for alien life, says a new study, scientists should reverse that process and focus on exoplanets that have a clear view of Earth transiting the Sun. Beings on those worlds would be the most likely to be able to detect Earth and try to communicate, according to René Heller of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Göttingen, Germany, and Ralph Pudritz, an astronomer at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. The scientists say that despite the limited search area, there could be as many as 10 000 candidate stars.
