Ontdek de Fascinerende Wereld van UFO's en UAP's: Jouw Bron voor Onthullende Informatie!
Ben jij ook gefascineerd door het onbekende? Wil je meer weten over UFO's en UAP's, niet alleen in België, maar over de hele wereld? Dan ben je op de juiste plek!
België: Het Kloppend Hart van UFO-onderzoek
In België is BUFON (Belgisch UFO-Netwerk) dé autoriteit op het gebied van UFO-onderzoek. Voor betrouwbare en objectieve informatie over deze intrigerende fenomenen, bezoek je zeker onze Facebook-pagina en deze blog. Maar dat is nog niet alles! Ontdek ook het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt en Caelestia, twee organisaties die diepgaand onderzoek verrichten, al zijn ze soms kritisch of sceptisch.
Nederland: Een Schat aan Informatie
Voor onze Nederlandse buren is er de schitterende website www.ufowijzer.nl, beheerd door Paul Harmans. Deze site biedt een schat aan informatie en artikelen die je niet wilt missen!
Internationaal: MUFON - De Wereldwijde Autoriteit
Neem ook een kijkje bij MUFON (Mutual UFO Network Inc.), een gerenommeerde Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in de VS en wereldwijd. MUFON is toegewijd aan de wetenschappelijke en analytische studie van het UFO-fenomeen, en hun maandelijkse tijdschrift, The MUFON UFO-Journal, is een must-read voor elke UFO-enthousiasteling. Bezoek hun website op www.mufon.com voor meer informatie.
Samenwerking en Toekomstvisie
Sinds 1 februari 2020 is Pieter niet alleen ex-president van BUFON, maar ook de voormalige nationale directeur van MUFON in Vlaanderen en Nederland. Dit creëert een sterke samenwerking met de Franse MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP, wat ons in staat stelt om nog meer waardevolle inzichten te delen.
Let op: Nepprofielen en Nieuwe Groeperingen
Pas op voor een nieuwe groepering die zich ook BUFON noemt, maar geen enkele connectie heeft met onze gevestigde organisatie. Hoewel zij de naam geregistreerd hebben, kunnen ze het rijke verleden en de expertise van onze groep niet evenaren. We wensen hen veel succes, maar we blijven de autoriteit in UFO-onderzoek!
Blijf Op De Hoogte!
Wil jij de laatste nieuwtjes over UFO's, ruimtevaart, archeologie, en meer? Volg ons dan en duik samen met ons in de fascinerende wereld van het onbekende! Sluit je aan bij de gemeenschap van nieuwsgierige geesten die net als jij verlangen naar antwoorden en avonturen in de sterren!
Heb je vragen of wil je meer weten? Aarzel dan niet om contact met ons op te nemen! Samen ontrafelen we het mysterie van de lucht en daarbuiten.
Vrijdag 26 augustus 2016
UFO Sighting Over Small Arizona City On Aug 20, 2016, Video, UFO Sighting News.
UFO Sighting Over Small Arizona City On Aug 20, 2016, Video, UFO Sighting News.
Date of sighting: August 20, 2016
Location of sighting: Buckeye, Arizona, USA
This is awesome...why? Because its an overcast day with massively thick and dark clouds in the sky. What that means is that nothing could shine bright enough to break through those clouds...no stars, no night sky, no moon. So any argument that this is a star is a waste of breath. This glowing object is checking out the neighborhood and could be interested in the lighting that comes from such clouds. These clouds build up a special kind of lighting rare around the world...called colored lighting. It could contain energy that the UFO or alien drone needs to continue its research mission. You often see lighting in these clouds in Arizona...without even a drop of rain to be had...I use to live in Bullhead city, Arizona and Needles, California for a few years, where I often saw the rainbow color lighting...loved it.
Just had a UFO sighting in Buckeye, Arizona August 20th, 2014 at 7:25 pm. Have no idea what I just witnessed. Maybe it's a UFO or maybe just a drone, nevertheless it was kinda strange to see this hovering over our neighborhood in the middle of a thunderstorm. The sound of my AC unit in the background possibly drowned out any sound the object was making. Please understand, I'm not saying this is an alien spacecraft, I'm just saying that I have no idea what this object is and the fact that it was flying makes this an "Unidentified Flying Object"
Hollywood Rowan Blanchard Catches UFO Over New York City, Aug 23, 2016, UFO Sighting New
Date of sighting: August 23, 2016
Location of sighing: New York City, New York, USA
Today own Instagram Hollywood star Rowan Blanchard posted a photo of a UFO that has he fans a buzz. While visiting in New York City, she chanced to take a photo during a beautiful sunset, and accidnetly captured a UFO disk that is 90% cloaked. Remember what I said about sunset being the most common time for UFOs to be seen? Its due to the bending of the light, the observer (us) and the angle of the sun.
She stated, "Say what u will but that thing was just appearing in the photo and wasn't physically there ..... 👽." This is a fantastic catch and I am so glad she shared it with us all. This is 100% evidence that aliens do watch over New York City with enthusiasm.
Vlakbij de meest nabije ster is een levensvatbare aarde-achtige planeet ontdekt. Dat meldt het ESO, de Europese Zuidelijke Sterrenwacht. Die planeet kan de dichtste woonplaats van leven buiten ons zonnestelsel zijn.
De planeet draait in een baan om Proxima Centauri, de dichtste ster buiten ons zonnestelsel. Die bevindt zich zo’n vier lichtjaar van de aarde, omgerekend een goeie veertig biljoen kilometer. De planeet, die de naam Proxima b kreeg, is ongeveer 1.3 keer zo groot als onze aarde. Ze draait op een afstand van ongeveer zeven miljoen kilometer rond de koele moederster, amper vijf procent van de afstand tussen de aarde en de zon. Maar Proxima Centauri is een rode dwergster en een stuk zwakker dan onze ster, waardoor de planeet zich toch in een levensvatbare zone bevindt.
Het lijkt erop dat vloeibaar water alleen op het oppervlak aanwezig kan zijn in de zonnigste gebieden. De draaiing van planeet Proxima b, de sterke straling van de ster en de vormingsgeschiedenis van de planeet zorgen ervoor dat het klimaat nogal verschilt van dat op aarde en dat het onwaarschijnlijk is dat er op Proxima b seizoenen voorkomen. Volgens de ESO zal Proxima b "een belangrijk doelwit zijn in de jacht naar het bewijs van leven elders in het heelal.”
Planet Found in Habitable Zone Around Nearest Star - Pale Red Dot campaign reveals Earth-mass world...
Astronomers using ESO telescopes and other facilities have found clear evidence of a planet orbiting the closest star to Earth, Proxima Centauri. The long-sought world, designated Proxima b, orbits...
Nearly 8000 Strange Blue Lakes Have Appeared in Antarctica
Satellite Image by Digital Globe Inc
IN BRIEF
Researchers studying East Antarctica have observed nearly 8,000 dazzling, blue lakes appeared on the Langhovde Glacier between 2000 and 2013. Not just a sign of global warming, these so-called supraglacial lakes can cause an ice sheet to collapse.
SUPRAGLACIAL LAKES
Oftentimes, the sight of spectacularly blue water is enough to make anyone happy. Unfortunately, not in this case.
Scientists studying East Antarctica, the largest ice mass on Earth, have discovered blue lakes sprouting like summer blooms on the Langhovde Glacier, an outlet glacier located at the Soya Coast.
From 2000 through 2013, scientists have been using satellite imagery to study East Antarctica’s Dronning Maud Land. And in a new study published in the Geophysical Research Letters, researchers state they’ve observed close to 8,000 lakes appearing on the surface of glaciers across the region.
Since the water is found on top of the glaciers, they are distinguished as “supraglacial.” Essentially, they are formed when the increasingly warm summer air heats the surface of an ice sheet.
These lakes were first seen spreading across Greenland and serve as beautiful, yet ominous, evidence of global climate change.
Langhovde Glacier. Source: Hokkaido University
COLLAPSING ICE SHELVES
One of the results of the lakes’ formation is the drainage from the lake traveling and weakening the more vulnerable parts of the glacier. Researchers believe this drainage caused the shattering of the Larsen B ice shelf on the warmer Antarctic Peninsula in 2002, among possible other events.
This occurring now in East Antarctica is a signal of the further consequences of rising temperatures. “That’s the part of the continent where people have for quite a long time assumed that it’s relatively stable, there’s not a huge amount of change, it’s very, very cold, and so it’s only very recently that the first supraglacial lakes, on top of the ice, were identified,”Stewart Jamieson, one of the study authors and a glaciologist at UK’s Durham University, toldThe Washington Post.
Scientists are quite concerned about the long term consequences of increased melting. In an email to Gizmodo, lead study author Emily Langley stressed the importance of monitoring “these in the future to see how they evolve with surface air temperature changes.”
NASA Just Made Contact With a Lost Spacecraft After Two Years of Silence
NASA
IN BRIEF
After almost two years of losing contact with one of its spacecrafts, NASA finally reestablishes communications with the STEREO-B as it starts to move out of the Sun's interference zone.
MISSED CONNECTIONS
In October of 2006, NASA launched the third mission of its Solar Terrestrial Probes program: the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory, also known as STEREO.
Two spacecrafts, STEREO-A and STEREO-B, were sent off on a mission to further understand the Sun-Earth system, particularly how violent eruptions on the Sun disrupt satellites and power grids on Earth, and when they might happen. This is also very critical for astronauts on errands outside the International Space Station, and could create potentially devastatingeffects to life on Earth.
STEREO-A and STEREO-B. NASA.
However, on October 1, 2014, STEREO-B lost its connection to Earth as it moved to the far side of the Sun. Meanwhile, STEREO-A maintained contact but had a weakened signal for about a year before returning to its normal performance.
Deep Space Network: Goldstone, California antenna. NASA.
NASA explains that the spacecrafts’ slow drift and orbit eventually leads to a disadvantageous alignment to the Sun and Earth: “Since August 2014, our line of communication to the spacecraft (STEREO-A) was so close to the sun that pointing the antenna straight at Earth also meant pointing it nearly directly at the sun, which would cause the spacecraft’s antenna to dangerously overheat.”
LOST AND FOUND
Finally, after almost two years of failed recovery attempts, NASA finally reestablished contact with STEREO-B using NASA’s Deep Space Network (DSN) on August 21. They will be checking if the spacecraft’s systems are all in place despite the hard reset they executed as a test before losing the STEREO-B, which should get easier as the spacecraft moves closer, and outside the Sun’s interference zone.
With DSN on the job, consistent communications with STEREO-B will hopefully be restored. After all: “When it comes to making a long-distance call, it’s hard to top NASA’s Deep Space Network,” NASA says.
Aiming to become a global space giant, China unveils some information on its first mission to Mars in 2020—with the goal of finding ice and water on the Red Planet.
Mankind’s insatiable hunger for knowledge has sparked another mission to find out whether Mars was ever occupied by living organisms.
Concept portrayal of China’s Mars probe. China Daily.
Stepping back onto the space exploration scene, China is giving us a computer-generated glimpse of the design for its space probe and rover, which will be used in its first ever Mars mission in 2020. The goal: find ice and water on the Red Planet.
According to Reuters, the mission will initially go into orbit around Mars before deploying a lander that will touch down in the low latitudes of Mars’ northern hemisphere, where the rover will explore the surface.
Concept portrayal of China’s Mars rover and lander. China Daily.
Carrying a number of instruments ranging from cameras to a ground-penetrating radar, the lander’s six-wheeled rover will be the one to roam the Red Planet.
Although China would be the fifth country to orbit Mars, President Xi Jinping’s unyielding resolve to become a global space giant emerged in the undertaking of this endeavor.
“Becoming an aerospace power has always been a dream we’ve been striving for,” he said.
Using the combined powers of two telescopes, researchers were able to gain visibility over a massive star in our galaxy that is 30 times the size of the sun—and is still growing. Much can be learned about the lifespan of supermassive stars.
TELESCOPES UNITE
Astronomers have their eyes on a young star around 11,000 light-years away from Earth, and for very good reasons. The massive young star, G11.92-0.61 MM1, or MM1 for short, is in our galaxy and reached its size faster than normal stars. “An average star like our Sun is formed over a few million years, whereas massive stars are formed orders of magnitude faster – around 100,000 years,” said team leader John Ilee, from the University of Cambridge in the UK.
The finding, published in the Monthly Notices of The Royal Astrological Society, is a rare one because while the dense clouds of molecular material make stellar nurseries perfect for birthing stars, those clouds of space dust make it very hard for normal telescopes to see through the clouds. Being able to watch this young star mature is an exceptional chance to monitor and better understand a massive star’s lifecycle.
Artist’s impression, MM1. Credit: A. Smith, Institute of Astronomy, Cambridge.
Using the combined powers of the Submillimetre Array (SMA) in Hawaii and the (aptly named)Very Large Array (VLA) in New Mexico, which offer longer wavelengths than most telescopes, the team not only managed to spot the star but also to assess its surroundings.
EAT FAST, DIE FAST
At a young age, MM1 is already over 30 times the size of the Sun…and it’s still hungry. And it seems the MM1 still has a front seat to a full buffet, as calculations show a large disc of matter surrounding it. This is called a Keplerian disc, thus named for the law of motion it follows. Particles closer to the star move faster than those on the outer edges.
This disc implies that supermassive stars start out just like normal stars. “This type of rotation is also seen in the Solar System – the inner planets rotate around the Sun more quickly than the outer planets,” Ilee explained. “It’s exciting to find such a disc around a massive young star, because it suggests that massive stars form in a similar way to lower mass stars, like our Sun.”
So what else is on the table for MM1 (apart from lots of star food)? Well, death.
From what we know of stars, the faster they eat (and the more they do), the sooner they die. This makes finding them in their early stages of death by gluttony a rare occurrence. “These massive stars also burn through their fuel much more quickly, so they have shorter overall lifespans, making them harder to catch when they are infants,” Ilee says.
Photo: ALMA Observatory.
However, before MM1’s imminent demise, which would end up in either a supernova or a black hole (this is a debate), researchers want to use the Atacama Large Millimetre Array (ALMA) in Chile to confirm if the Keplerian disc around it is hiding more. “Our theoretical calculations suggest that the disc could, in fact, be hiding even more mass under layers of gas and dust,” says team member Duncan Forgan. “The disc may even be so massive that it can break up under its own gravity, forming a series of less massive companion protostars.”
Former NASA whistleblower's shock claim space agency hid PROOF of UFOs orbiting Saturn
A DECORATED former NASA scientist has claimed the US space agency has proof that alien UFOs have been orbiting Saturn for years, but the shocking fact has been withheld from the public.
Dr Norman Bergrun, a distinguished engineer who has worked with NASA’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California, said the rings of the planet are a massive meeting place for extraterrestrials.
He claims "alien UFO spaceships" have started "proliferating" at a shocking rate on the planet's many rings, which are made up of "space crafts and their exhaust fumes" but the world-changing evidence has been covered up at high-level within the US Government.
The former NASA engineer, who has written books on his claims and done numerous interviews, believes the number of UFO crafts in the solar system had reached "critical" levels.
Bizarrely, Dr Bergrun claims the spaceships include living entities, which use the rings as a source of energy, and are multiplying and spreading to other planets such as Uranus and Jupiter.
Dr Bergrun developed “roll stability laws for airplanes, missiles and rockets.”
YouTube
Dr Norman Bergrun claims UFOs are in Saturn's rings.
He also won prestigious awards, including the California Society of Professional Engineers Archimedes Engineering Achievement Award.
Dr Bergrun, who served on the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) and worked with Lockheed Martin on high-profile and top-secret aerospace projects, first launched his theory in 1986 with his book Ringmakers of Saturn, but continues to promote it and is annoyed that scientists do not appear to be giving it any credence.
He said: "What I found out is, these things inhabit Saturn, that’s where I first discovered them, and they’re proliferating. You can find them around Uranus and Jupiter.
"Wherever you see some rings, that’s where I see the aircrafts, I call them a ring maker.
What I found out is, these things inhabit Saturn, that’s where I first discovered them, and they’re proliferating. You can find them around Uranus and Jupiter.
Dr Norman Bergrun
"I say that it is electromagnetic because I can identify streamline patterns with respect to it that I knew were what we called 'potential lines' and that says it was electrical."
Dr Bergrun has produced historic NASA images of the rings, which he claims show UFOs, including cylindrical objects.
But he claimed we have been unable to communicate with any of these aliens so far, and they could ultimately pose a threat to Earth.
He warned that the proliferation of the crafts across our solar system was speeding up and reaching a “critical” stage.
He claims the crafts are “living” because they are capable of the essential functions of biological systems, such as self-replication and self-maintenance.
Mainstream scientists dismiss his extraordinary claims, but the UFO community is captivated.
Conspiracy website Collective Evolution said: "We can assume that he knows and has worked with other intelligent and powerful people and that he has had access to extremely sensitive data, which he himself makes clear… in his book.”
And UFO blogger Scott C Waring wrote: "Norman Bergrun worked in a top secret area inside the US government and has personally witnessed seeing photos directly from NASA that had UFO near Saturn that make the rings around Saturn.
"He says he has personally seen an increase of alien ship activity among the rings of Saturn over his career. Something has to be done."
Exoplanètes: «Une preuve de vie extraterrestre d'ici dix ans»
ESPACE L'astrophysicien Michaël Gillon nous en dit plus sur la découverte de la planète Proxima B...
Vue d'artiste de la planète Proxima B, avec son étoile, la naine rouge Proxima du Centaure, au loin - M. Kornmesser / EUROPEAN SOUTHERN OBSERVATORY / AFP
Jamais on n’avait découvert d’exoplanète aussi proche de nous. La confirmation, mardi dans Nature, de la découverte de Proxima B, dans l’orbite de l’étoile Proxima du Centaure, se double d’une jolie surprise : La planète tourne autour de son étoile à une distance qui rend possible la présence d’eau liquide et de vie à sa surface.
Proxima du Centaure est bien connue des chercheurs qui traquent les planètes situées en dehors du système solaire, car c’est la plus proche de notre soleil. L’astrophysicien belge Michael Gillon, de l’Université de Liège, co-découvreur de plusieurs exoplanètes « potentiellement habitables », analyse l’importance de cette découverte.
On a découvert plus de 3.000 planètes en dehors du système solaire, depuis la première en 1995. Pourquoi ne découvre-t-on que maintenant celle qui tourne autour de Proxima du Centaure ?
Parce que le système de Proxima du Centaure n’est pas facile à examiner. L’étoile est proche, mais beaucoup moins brillante que le soleil (670 fois moins), elle pèse 10 % de son poids et émet essentiellement de la lumière infrarouge. D’ailleurs, de la Terre on ne la voit pas à l’œil nu, il faut une lunette pour l’observer…
Dans mon équipe nous avons déjà essayé de scruter ce système par la méthode du « transit » (on guette la baisse de luminosité qui résulte du passage d’une planète devant l’étoile), sans rien détecter. Là, ils ont pu utiliser une autre méthode, gravitationnelle (on détecte indirectement les mouvements de la planète), avec une quantité de données très importante.
Cette planète, Proxima B, est située à une distance de 4,2 années-lumière, soit quarante mille milliards de kilomètres. Que change cette découverte ?
C’est très enthousiasmant qu’une étoile si proche de nous dispose d’une planète potentiellement habitable. Et il est possible qu’avec certains instruments on soit assez rapidement capables d’observer directement l’image de cette planète, et de détecter une atmosphère, si elle en a une.
La prochaine étape, c’est la découverte de vie extraterrestre. Comment procède-t-on ?
On cherche des signes de cette vie en guettant, par exemple dans la lumière émise par la planète, des traces de molécules caractéristiques de la vie. Ce sont des « biomarqueurs ». Cela peut-être de l’oxygène en grande quantité, si on prouve qu’aucun autre phénomène n’a pu le produire. Avec les nouveaux instruments qui sont en train d’être mis en place, je pense que l’on peut espérer une telle découverte d’ici une dizaine d’années.
Exoplanètes: «Une preuve de vie extraterrestre d'ici dix ans»
ESPACE L'astrophysicien Michaël Gillon nous en dit plus sur la découverte de la planète Proxima B...
Vue d'artiste de la planète Proxima B, avec son étoile, la naine rouge Proxima du Centaure, au loin - M. Kornmesser / EUROPEAN SOUTHERN OBSERVATORY / AFP
Jamais on n’avait découvert d’exoplanète aussi proche de nous. La confirmation, mardi dans Nature, de la découverte de Proxima B, dans l’orbite de l’étoile Proxima du Centaure, se double d’une jolie surprise : La planète tourne autour de son étoile à une distance qui rend possible la présence d’eau liquide et de vie à sa surface.
Proxima du Centaure est bien connue des chercheurs qui traquent les planètes situées en dehors du système solaire, car c’est la plus proche de notre soleil. L’astrophysicien belge Michael Gillon, de l’Université de Liège, co-découvreur de plusieurs exoplanètes « potentiellement habitables », analyse l’importance de cette découverte.
On a découvert plus de 3.000 planètes en dehors du système solaire, depuis la première en 1995. Pourquoi ne découvre-t-on que maintenant celle qui tourne autour de Proxima du Centaure ?
Parce que le système de Proxima du Centaure n’est pas facile à examiner. L’étoile est proche, mais beaucoup moins brillante que le soleil (670 fois moins), elle pèse 10 % de son poids et émet essentiellement de la lumière infrarouge. D’ailleurs, de la Terre on ne la voit pas à l’œil nu, il faut une lunette pour l’observer…
Dans mon équipe nous avons déjà essayé de scruter ce système par la méthode du « transit » (on guette la baisse de luminosité qui résulte du passage d’une planète devant l’étoile), sans rien détecter. Là, ils ont pu utiliser une autre méthode, gravitationnelle (on détecte indirectement les mouvements de la planète), avec une quantité de données très importante.
Cette planète, Proxima B, est située à une distance de 4,2 années-lumière, soit quarante mille milliards de kilomètres. Que change cette découverte ?
C’est très enthousiasmant qu’une étoile si proche de nous dispose d’une planète potentiellement habitable. Et il est possible qu’avec certains instruments on soit assez rapidement capables d’observer directement l’image de cette planète, et de détecter une atmosphère, si elle en a une.
La prochaine étape, c’est la découverte de vie extraterrestre. Comment procède-t-on ?
On cherche des signes de cette vie en guettant, par exemple dans la lumière émise par la planète, des traces de molécules caractéristiques de la vie. Ce sont des « biomarqueurs ». Cela peut-être de l’oxygène en grande quantité, si on prouve qu’aucun autre phénomène n’a pu le produire. Avec les nouveaux instruments qui sont en train d’être mis en place, je pense que l’on peut espérer une telle découverte d’ici une dizaine d’années.
VIDEO. Faites chauffer la fusée, une potentielle «seconde Terre» découverte à deux pas de chez nous
ASTRONOMIEProxima du Centaure est l'étoile la plus proche du Soleil, et le système abrite une planète sans doute rocheuse...
Vue d'artiste de Proxima b, la planète la plus proche de la Terre. - ESO, M. KORNMESSER
C’est le Graal de l’astronomie. Des chercheurs ont bien découvert une exoplanèteautour de l’étoile la plus proche du Soleil, Proxima du Centaure, dans une zone où l’eau liquide peut exister à la surface. La rumeur, qui courrait depuis deux semaines, a été confirmée mercredi par la publication officielle dans le magazine Nature. « La chasse à la vie peut commencer », écrit son auteur principal, l’astronome Guillem Anglada-Escudé, de l’université Queen Mary de Londres.
Cette fois, il ne s’agit pas d’une erreur
Avant de réserver son billet pour un aller simple, plusieurs précisions importantes s’imposent. Proxima b, située à 4,2 années-lumière du Soleil, a une masse minimum de 1,3 fois celle de la Terre. Les chercheurs supposent qu’elle est rocheuse mais ils n’en ont pas la preuve. Ils ne savent pas non plus si elle possède une atmosphère, de l’eau liquide et tous les composés nécessaires à l’éclosion de la vie telle que nous la connaissons.
Les sceptiques se rappelleront encore que la dernière découverte d’une planète « candidate » autour de Proxima du Centaure avait finalement été rétractée. Mais cette fois, les mesures réalisées avec deux télescopes différents laissent peu de place au doute. « Les instruments ont fait d’immenses progrès. Après avoir lu l’étude, je suis convaincu que cette planète est réelle », juge l’astronome Phil Plaitsur son blog Bad Astronomy.
Le tour de son étoile en 11 jours
Proxima b se trouve à seulement 7,5 millions de kilomètres de son étoile. C’est 20 fois plus près que la Terre du Soleil. Elle en fait le tour en seulement 11,2 jours. Mais parce que Proxima du Centaure est une naine rouge de faible intensité, de l’eau liquide peut, sur le papier, exister à la surface.
La donne est cependant compliquée par la configuration de la planète, en verrouillage gravitationnel avec son étoile, comma la Terre avec la Lune. Traduction : c’est toujours la même face qui est au « soleil », et il n’y a pas de saison. On ne parle même pas des violentes éruptions solaires, face auxquelles une protection (atmosphère dense, champ magnétique) est indispensable. Bref, il va falloir observer la planète directement, et le télescope spatial James Webb, qui doit prendre la relève d’Hubble en 2018, arrivera à point nommé.
Si près et pourtant si loin
A 4,2 années-lumière, Proxima b est la planète la plus proche de la Terre. Mais avec les systèmes actuels de propulsion, il faudrait entre 20.000 et 80.000 ans à une sonde pour s’y rendre. Le projet Starshot, qui mise sur une voile solaire accélérée par des rayons laser pour atteindre 20 % de la vitesse de la lumière, permettrait toutefois de réduire la durée du voyage d’une micro-sonde à une vingtaine d’années. Allez, on espère être encore vivant pour assister à ce grand moment…
(CNN)In a discovery that has been years in the making, researchers have confirmed the existence of a rocky planet named Proxima b orbiting Proxima Centauri, the closest star to our sun, according to a new study. It is the closest exoplanet to us in the universe.
Given the fact that Proxima b is within the habitable zone of its star, meaning liquid water could exist on the surface, it may also be the closest possible home for life outside of our solar system, the researchers said.
Because of its location, the researchers hope it provides an opportunity for possible "robotic exploration in the coming centuries."
This artist's impression shows a view of the surface of the planet Proxima b.
"The good news is that it is so close," study author Ansgar Reiners said. "It is not only nice for having it in our neighborhood, but it's a dream come true for astronomers if we think about follow-up observation."
Proxima Centauri coexists with a binary star in Alpha Centauri, a well-studied star system that serves as a neighbor to our sun.
Proxima b is a mere 4.2 light-years away from our solar system, or 266,000 times the distance between the Earth and the sun, which are 92.96 million miles apart. Previous rocky exoplanet discoveries, like those orbiting ultracool red dwarf star TRAPPIST-1, were previously described as "close" at 40 light-years away.
"It's not only the closest terrestrial planet found, it's probably the closest planet outside our solar system that will ever be found because there is no star closer to the solar system than this one," said lead study author Guillem Anglada-Escudé.
"The only thing you can hope to find between that is Planet Nine, but that would (require) a solar system object or a brown dwarf that hasn't been discovered," researcher Pedro Amado added.
Here is what we know about the planet, as well as the questions that researchers hope to be able to answer.
Meet Proxima b
Proxima b is a rocky, terrestrial planet with a surface -- unlike a gas giant, such as Jupiter -- that is 1.3 times the size of Earth and orbits its star every 11.2 days. It is in a close orbit of Proxima Centauri: only 5% of the distance between the Earth and the sun. They are even closer together than Mercury and the sun. But because its star is much cooler and fainter than our sun, Proxima b has a temperature that is suitable for liquid water to exist on the surface without evaporating.
Researchers estimate that if the planet has an atmosphere, which could be assumed but isn't known, it may be between 86 to 104 degrees Fahrenheit (31 to 40 degrees Celsius) on the surface. Without an atmosphere, it could be -22 to -40 degrees Fahrenheit (-30 to -40 degrees Celsius). To put that in perspective, Earth would be -4 degrees (-20 degrees Celsius) if it didn't have an atmosphere, Reiners said.
Given the proximity to its star, Proxima b is also subject to less pleasant factors like ultraviolet and X-ray flares that are 100 times the intensity of what Earth receives from the sun. In the paper, researchers estimated it to be 400 times the intensity, but recent research has caused them to create a new estimate, they said. If there is life on the planet, it would be affected by this radiation, but it is pure speculation as to what kind of effect.
This infographic compares the orbit of the planet around Proxima Centauri (Proxima b) with the same region of the Solar System.
What took so long?
If the Alpha Centauri system is well-studied and Proxima Centauri is our sun's cozy star neighbor in the universe, why did it take so long to find Proxima b?
It comes down to an understanding of the star this planet orbits, as well as how data collection has evolved during the last 16 years.
Proxima Centauri is a low-mass red dwarf star, known as an M-class dwarf, that happens to be close to the bright binary star Alpha Centauri AB, which outshines its cool stepbrother, so to speak. All of these stars are within the faint Centaurus constellation, which can't be seen with the unaided eye.
M-class dwarves are not well understood in comparison with other types of stars, Reiners said. Because of that, researchers don't know much about the history of these stars or their radiation in the early days.
"But within the field of exoplants, [researchers] have recently realized that looking for planets around M dwarves is what is going to be the most spectacular, because you can find these plants in the liquid water zone more easily than other stars," Reiners said.
Because it's an active star, Proxima Centauri can behave in varied ways that mimic the presence of a planet, according to the study. Researchers wanted to observe it for a long period of time, so for the first half of this year, telescopes around the world were pointed at Proxima Centauri. The researchers looked for a "Doppler wobble," or back and forth wobble of Proxima Centauri that would be caused by the gravitational pull of a planet in orbit.
This was combined with research, data and published studies of Proxima Centauri dating to 2000.
"The significance of the detection went sky high," Anglada-Escudé said. "Statistically, there was no doubt. We have found a planet around Proxima Centauri."
The research around Proxima b will continue, and the researchers have more questions they want to answer. They don't know whether there is water on the surface or if the planet has an atmosphere, although both are likely. They also don't know whether, like Earth, the planet has a protective magnetic field to help with some of the radiation it receives.
Perhaps one of the biggest questions includes the history of the star and the planet. How did they form?
"What happened during the formation?" Reiners asked. "Was the star more active than the sun is today, and where during that phase was Proxima b located?"
This would indicate whether the plant was rich with water in its early days or started out dry, as well as whether there was any high-energy radiation that could have blasted away an atmosphere during formation of the planet.
A view of the southern skies over the ESO 3.6-meter telescope at La Silla Observatory in Chile with images of the stars Proxima Centauri (lower right) and the double star Alpha Centauri AB (lower left).
There is also some debate over whether this planet is Earth-like, which comes with some connotations. Depending on its formation, perhaps it could be like Venus.
Learning the answers to these questions about formation are possible with research. The habitability of a planet like Proxima b is also "a matter of intense debate," according to the study, due to arguments against it: tidal locking, strong stellar magnetic fields, strong flares, and high ultraviolet and X-ray fluxes. But, as they point out, none of those has been proved definitive, either.
Growing excitement
Researchers have long looked to Alpha Centauri for study. Now, they want us to go there.
Programs like Mission Centaur intend to design and build a space mission with a small telescope to point at the star system. It would look for exoplanets by imaging or other techniques that could find more of them around these three stars. Given how long it took us to confirm Proxima b and the fact that the researchers encountered a puzzling extra signal in some of their data and models, it's entirely possible that there are more planets to be found.
It is also the target of the Starshot project, which aims to create and send ultra-fast light-driven nanocraft that would reach the system 20 years after launch and beam home images. This is on the list of Breakthrough initiatives,an effort whose board includes Stephen Hawking and Mark Zuckerberg.
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Because Proxima b exists outside our solar system, it doesn't change our well-known roster of planets (and we know some of you are still rather upset over Pluto). But it does add to the field of exoplanet research that's underway, some of which hopes to identify Earth-like planets that future telescopes, such as the James Webb Space Telescope and the European Extremely Large Telescope, can use for observation.
Many researchers hope that we can actually image these planets in the future, getting an idea of their atmospheric makeup and surface composition, and strive to answer the question of "Are we alone in the universe?"
"We know that there are terrestrial planets around stars. The excitement is because it's the nearest one, and we expect to characterize it and maybe visit in a couple of centuries," Anglada-Escudé said.
Mediterraans mysterie: Woonde de mythische beschaving van Atlantis op Sardinië?
Luchtbeelden die onlangs zijn gemaakt lijken de theorie te bevestigen dat de mythische beschaving van Atlantis mogelijk op het Italiaanse eiland Sardinië woonde. Dat meldt de krant La Stampa.
De Italiaanse journalist Sergio Frau stelt dat Sardinië exact overeenkomt met de beschrijving die Plato gaf: een land dat rijk is aan water en bossen, met een zacht klimaat, waardoor men het hele jaar door kan oogsten.
Tsunami
Plato noemde de inwoners van Atlantis daarnaast ‘torenbouwers’. Op Sardinië staan veel oude stenen forten. Eén van deze monumenten werd gevonden in de gemeente Barumini. Het kostte archeologen 14 jaar om het bouwwerk onder een 12 meter dikke laag modder vandaan te halen.
Uit luchtbeelden blijkt dat vrijwel alle oude bouwwerken die zich vlak boven de zeespiegel bevinden, bedekt werden door modder, terwijl de overige gebouwen buiten schot bleven. Mogelijk was de modderstroom het gevolg van een tsunami, die volgens de legende de inwoners van Atlantis wegvaagde.
Zuilen van Hercules
Plato schreef dat Atlantis 9000 jaar geleden werd vernietigd, maar in die tijd waren er nog geen beschavingen in het Middellandse Zeegebied. Plato bedoelde mogelijk 9000 maanden in plaats van jaren, omdat in zijn tijd vaak in maanden werd gerekend.
In dat geval verwijst Plato naar 1200 voor Christus. In die periode deden zich op het Italiaanse eiland krachtige aardbevingen voor. Het is bekend dat Atlantis zich ten westen van de Zuilen van Hercules bevond. Volgens de legende waren die tot de derde eeuw voor Christus niet in de Straat van Gibraltar, maar in de Golf van Tunis gelegen, tussen Sicilië en Tunesië.
Ligt buitenaards leven dan toch niet zo ver van ons af als we dachten? Gisteren had de Europese Zuidelijke Sterrenwacht ESO groot nieuws voor de wereld: er is bewijs gevonden dat rond de meest nabije ster een planeet draait die levensvatbaar kan zijn. Mogelijk is er dus een nabije woonplaats voor leven buiten ons zonnestelsel. Nu ja, zo nabij is Proxima b nu ook weer niet: 4,22 lichtjaar, ofwel 40 biljoen kilometer. Hoe kunnen we ooit zo ver reizen?
Vorig jaar kwam de New Horizons-sonde van NASA aan op Pluto na een trip van 4,8 miljard kilometer. De sonde was negen jaar onderweg geweest en haalde snelheden tot 84.000 kilometer per uur. Mochten we de New Horizons naar Proxima b sturen, dan zou die 54.400 jaar onderweg zijn. Niet echt een optie dus.
Vorige maand haalde de Juno-sonde van NASA, die in een baan rond Jupiter draait, een snelheid van 265.000 kilometer per uur. Met die snelheid komen we weliswaar vroeger aan op Proxima b, maar dan nog zou het 17.157 jaar duren.
In de jaren 90 pakten het Amerikaanse leger en NASA uit met Project Longshot, waarbij een sonde dankzij waterstofbommen snelheden zou halen tot 13.400 kilometer per seconde. Mocht dat ooit lukken, dan zijn we er binnen 100 jaar.
Proxima b bereiken, is dus een werk van heel lange adem, laat staan dat we er ooit voet aan land kunnen zetten. Maar dankzij een nieuwe technologie wordt het misschien mogelijk om Proxima b over 50 jaar te bereiken. Met project 'Starshot' wil miljardair Joeri Milner een sonde de ruimte insturen die wordt voortgedreven door een laserstraal en in 'amper' 20 jaar Proxima b bereikt. Ook Stephen Hawking steunt het project.
Een laserstraal zou, in theorie althans, een flinterdunne sonde met 215 miljoen kilometer per uur kunnen laten reizen. Dat is ongeveer 20 procent van de lichtsnelheid. Het zou nog 20 à 25 jaar duren voor die 'lasersonde' klaar is, dus we moeten toch nog zeker een kleine 50 jaar wachten voor we Proxima b ooit te zien krijgen. Bovendien zou het project zo'n 10 miljard dollar kosten.
10 miljard dollar uitgeven aan een reis naar een verre planeet, is dat wel de moeite waard? Wat als we op een gigantische ontgoocheling botsen?
Een trip naar Proxima b is zeker de moeite waard, dat bewees New Horizons al toen hij aankwam op Pluto. De sonde schoot unieke beelden van de dwergplaneet die we vanop de aarde nooit zouden kunnen genomen hebben. De sonde bezorgde ons een schat aan informatie over Pluto, dus een bezoekje aan de nieuwe Aarde is sowieso de moeite waard.
Ontdekken we over 50 jaar leven buiten ons zonnestelsel? Lees het antwoord hier in 2066.
China hoopt in juli of augustus 2020 een robotjeep naar Mars te lanceren. Het heeft via de staatsmedia een tip van de sluier over de verkenner gelicht.
Het is de bedoeling dat een Lange Mars-5 draagraket van op de nieuwe lanceerbasis Wenchang het tuig meeneemt en op een traject naar de Rode Planeet brengt. Na een reis van ongeveer zeven maanden moet de lander zich van een "orbiter" losmaken en uiteindelijk neerstrijken nabij de evenaar. Dan zal het gedurende een negentigtal dagen het Marsoppervlak en de omgeving bestuderen.
Tweehonderd kilo De jeep zal tweehonderd kilo wegen. Hij zal zes wielen en vier zonnepanelen hebben. Dertien instrumenten doen onderzoek naar sporen van water en ijs.
In het kader van zijn ambitieus ruimtevaartprogramma heeft Peking al een robotjeep op de Maan neergezet, om daar onderzoek te doen. India was het eerste Aziatisch land dat in september een sonde rond de Rode Planeet bracht.
Mislukken De opdracht zou niet gemakkelijk zijn. Zelfs de grote ruimtevaartmogendheden zagen zowat minstens de helft van missies naar Mars, in het bijzonder landingen, mislukken.
België is momenteel met apparatuur op de Europees-Russische sonde en lander ExoMars op weg naar de Rode Planeet.
‘Aarde Twee': Levensvatbare planeet ontdekt bij buurster van de zon
Astronomen hebben bewijs gevonden dat rond de meest dichtstbijzijnde ster een bewoonbare planeet draait. Dat laat de Europese Zuidelijke Sterrenwacht (ESO) weten.
De sterrenkundigen ontdekten met behulp van een reuzentelescoop in Chili een aardachtige planeet rond de ster Proxima Centauri. Dat is onze meest nabije buur. De planeet, Proxima b gedoopt, is 1,3 keer zo zwaar als de aarde en bevindt zich in de leefbare zone rond de ster.
Binnen bereik
Er is hoogstwaarschijnlijk vloeibaar water mogelijk op de planeet. Volgens het onderzoeksteam kan er leven aanwezig kan zijn op Proxima b. Er zijn intussen zo’n 200 aardachtige planeten bij verre sterren ontdekt, maar die staan stuk voor stuk op vele honderden lichtjaren.
Proxima Centauri staat op slechts 4,2 lichtjaar en komt langzaam maar zeker binnen het bereik van onze ruimtevaartuigen. Miljardair Joeri Milner wil binnen nu en 15 jaar een zogeheten ruimtezeil naar de ster sturen. Het ruimteschip zal ongeveer 20 jaar over de reis doen.
Een jaar op Proxima b duurt maar 11 dagen omdat de planeet veel dichter bij zijn ster staat dan de aarde bij de zon. Toch is het er niet heel warm, omdat Proxima Centauri een rode dwerg is, die veel koeler is dan onze zon.
Grootste ervaring
“De eerste waarnemingen waren er al in 2013, maar toen waren de waarnemingen niet overtuigend genoeg,” aldus onderzoeksleider Guillem Anglada-Escudé. “Sindsdien hebben we hard gewerkt om meer waarnemingen te doen.”
Hij voegde toe dat de vondst van de dichtstbijzijnde aardachtige exoplaneet de grootste ervaring van zijn leven is. De astronomen hebben hun bevindingen gepubliceerd in het wetenschappelijke vakblad Nature.
UFOs Hover Over Vegas While Helicopters buzz past to investigate, Aug 2016, Video, UFO Sighting News
Date of sighting: August 23, 2016
Location of sighting: Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
Here is an awesome video of some helicopters and planes buzzing past the three UFOs over Vegas. I'm sure radar must have seen these three UFOs...because if it didn't then we need to rethink better radar for protection of air accidents. This is in an area close to a Tall White base at Nellis AFB. Possibly aliens wanting to get as close as possible to the night life in Vegas...and who could blame them, but know, and adult Tall White is over 3 meters tall and would stand out in Vegas...also, if you accidentally touched them, they would take pleasure in your immediate death, so its best to avoid them.
I shot this video from my backyard in the Summerlin area of Las Vegas, Nevada on the night of August 23, 2016. The weather has improved greatly even though a wicked storm passed through later in the night. I could hear the wind and hail hitting the windows. Earlier it was actually really nice other than a tad bit of wind and haze. The night started off slowly and then all of a sudden things started happening. I got a short clip of a UFO in the southern valley and then I noticed the amazing UFOs over in the Henderson area. They were in a location where it's very rare to see anything. Once they began to move they ended up in a spot where I see them more routinely. This was just the beginning as I have more footage from the Blue Diamond Hills that I still need to publish.
Glowing UFO Tries To Escape Detection At Space Station, Aug 2016, UFO Sighting News.
Date if sighting: August 2016 Location of sighting: Earths orbit at ISS Once again, a UFO has been caught at the space station using the live cam. Streetcap1 had a watchful eye on the cams and was fortunate enough to record it for us. It looks like this UFO didn't want to be recorded, because it was seen moving away and high speed. But this just goes to show, that aliens are not gods or angels, but flawed beings just like us. They are not perfect, they make mistakes, just like this alien pilot made in this video...which will forever be on Youtube to show the world that the alien F#$%ed up. How does that feel aliens...having your flubs on Youtube for all the human race to see, laugh at and comment about? Scott C. Waring www.ufosightingsdaily.com Streetcap1 states: Not a clue what this is. Other people must have seen this too. It disappears into the Earth Light and does not reappear. Short sequence repeated several times over. Streetcap1.
The star closest to the sun hosts a planet that may be very much like Earth, a new study reports.
Astronomers have discovered a roughly Earth-size alien world around Proxima Centauri, which lies just 4.2 light-years from our own solar system. What's even more exciting, study team members said, is that the planet, known as Proxima b, circles in the star's "habitable zone" — the range of distances at which liquid water could be stable on a world's surface.
"We hope these findings inspire future generations to keep looking beyond the stars," lead author Guillem Anglada-Escude, a physics and astronomy lecturer at Queen Mary University of London, said in a statement."The search for life on Proxima b comes next." [In Pictures: The Discovery of Planet Proxima b]
A long search
The discovery of Proxima b was a long time in the making.
Astronomers have been hunting intensively for planets around Proxima Centauri for more 15 years, using instruments such as the Ultraviolet and Visual Echelle Spectrograph (UVES) and the High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS), both of which are installed on telescopes run by the European Southern Observatory in Chile.
This artist’s impression shows the exoplanet Proxima b, which orbits the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri. The double star Alpha Centauri AB appears in the image between the exoplanet and its star.
Credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser
UVES, HARPS and other instruments like them allow researchers to detect the slight wobbles in a star's movement caused by the gravitational tugs of orbiting planets.
Astronomers found hints of such a wobble back in 2013, but the signal was not convincing, Anglada-Escude said. So he and a number of other researchers launched a campaign to ferret out the planet. They called this effort the Pale Red Dot — a nod to Carl Sagan's famous description of Earth as a "pale blue dot," and the fact that Proxima Centauri is a small, dim star known as a red dwarf.
The Pale Red Dot team focused HARPS on Proxima Centauri every night from Jan. 19, 2016, through March 31 of this year. After they combined this new data with UVES observations from 2000 through 2008 and HARPS observations from 2005 through early 2014, the signal of a possible planet came through loud and clear.
Then, after analyzing observations of the star's brightness made by several other telescopes, Anglada-Escude and his colleagues ruled out the possibility that this signal could be caused by the variable activity of Proxima Centauri.
"The conclusion: We have found a planet around Proxima Centauri," Anglada-Escude said Tuesday (Aug. 23) during a news conference. [The Search for Another Earth (Video)]
How did Proxima b remain undetected for so long, in an era when astronomers are finding exoplanets thousands of light-years from Earth?
"The uneven and sparse sampling, combined with the longer term variability of the star, seem to be the reasons why the signal could not be unambiguously confirmed with pre-2016 data, rather than the total amount of data accumulated," the researchers wrote in the new study, which was published online today (Aug. 24) in the journal Nature.
The news confirms rumors first reported earlier this month by German magazine Der Spiegel.
Incidentally, the team also spotted possible signs of an additional Proxima Centauri planet, which would have an orbital period of between 60 and 500 days. But that second signal is much weaker and might be caused by stellar activity, the researchers said.
Artist's illustration of the surface of Proxima b, a potentially Earth-like world that circles the nearest star to the sun.
Credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser
An Earth-like world?
The HARPS and UVES data indicate that Proxima b is about 1.3 times more massive than Earth, which suggests that the exoplanet is a rocky world, the researchers said. [6 Strange Facts About Planet Proxima b]
Proxima b lies just 4.7 million miles (7.5 million kilometers) from its host star and completes one orbit every 11.2 Earth days. As a result, it's likely that the exoplanet is tidally locked, meaning it always shows the same face to its host star, just as the moon shows only one face (the near side) to Earth.
For comparison, Earth orbits about 93 million miles (150 million km) from the sun. But Proxima b's relatively tight orbit puts it right in the middle of the habitable zone, because red dwarfs are so much cooler and dimmer than sun-like stars, team members said. Not much else is known about Proxima b, so it's unclear just how hospitable the planet may be to life. In fact, there are reasons to be pessimistic on this front, noted Artie Hatzes, an astronomer at the Thuringian State Observatory in Germany.
Proxima Centauri fires off powerful flares, and the planet therefore experiences a much higher dose of high-energy X-ray radiation than Earth does, Hatzes, who is not part of the discovery team, wrote in an accompanying "News and Views" article in the same issue of Nature.
"Energetic particles associated with the flares may erode the atmosphere or hinder the development of primitive forms of life," Hatzes wrote. "We also don't know whether the exoplanet has a magnetic field, like Earth, which could shield it from the dangerous stellar radiation."
But the higher X-ray flux is not a "showstopper" for life, Anglada-Escude and his colleagues said.
"None of this does exclude the existence of an atmosphere, or of [surface] water," co-author Ansgar Reiners, a professor at the University of Göttingen's Institute of Astrophysics in Germany, said during Tuesday's news conference.
How Proxima Centauri behaved in the distant past is more relevant to the newfound planet's potential habitability than current radiation levels are, Reiners added.
A 'Habitable' Planet Found Around Nearest Star Proxima Centauri
"What is more interesting is the history of the planet — whether in the early ages, the young ages, of this planet the star was so active, and the star emitted so much high-energy radiation, that it blew away the atmosphere and may have blown away the water also," he said.
Other aspects of the planet's history also have a bearing on just how wet Proxima b may be. For example, if the alien world formed far from the star but then migrated inward, it is likely water-rich; if it formed near its present position, it likely started out much drier, study team members said. (But even this latter scenario doesn't preclude the existence of large amounts of water on Proxima b, Anglada-Escude stressed; comet and/or asteroid strikes could deliver the substance, as apparently happened here on Earth, he said.)
Tidally locked planets were once regarded as inhospitable to life — baked too hot on the star-facing side, and freezing cold on the dark side. But recent research suggests that such worlds may indeed be habitable; winds in theiratmospheres could distribute heat, smoothing out temperature extremes.
And if Proxima b is potentially habitable, life-forms have a long time to gain a foothold there: Red dwarfs keep burning for trillions of years, in contrast to stars like the sun, which die after 10 billion years or so.
"Proxima Centauri will exist for several hundreds or thousands of times longer than the sun," Hatzes wrote in his "News and Views" piece. "Any life on the planet could still be evolving long after our sun has died."
The sun is 4.6 billion years old. Proxima Centauri is thought to be slightly older — perhaps 4.9 billion years or so, study team members said.
New Earth Found - Gliese 581c Planet (NASA Documentary)
Proxima b likely does not "transit," or cross the face of, its host star from Earth's perspective, Anglada-Escude and his colleagues said.
That characteristic will make it tougher to study Proxima b further; astronomers can learn a lot about the atmospheres of transiting exoplanets by studying the starlight that passes through them. (NASA's $8.8 billion James Webb Space Telescope, which is scheduled to launch in late 2018, will use this method to look for possible signs of life in the atmospheres of nearby alien worlds.)
But Proxima b is close enough to Earth that scientists may soon be able to image it directly. Indeed, it should be possible to resolve the planet (separately from its host star) using a telescope with an aperture of 11.5 feet (3.5 meters), provided that the scope is outfitted with some advanced technology, such as a starlight-blocking coronagraph, Reiners said. (For perspective, NASA's famous Hubble Space Telescope has an aperture of 7.9 feet, or 2.4 m.)
"We are quite far from it right now, but physics allows us to do it," he said. "And then, you can study the light coming from the planet itself, and that gives you the opportunity to learn about the atmosphere spectroscopically or photometrically, or whatever you want."
This past April, scientists and engineers announced the $100 millionBreakthrough Starshot project, which aims to develop the technology required to accelerate tiny, sail-equipped "nanocraft" to 20 percent the speed of light using powerful lasers.
Breakthrough Starshot team members said they hope to eventually launch flotillas of such postage-stamp-size probes to Alpha Centauri — a binary star system about 4.37 light-years from the sun. (In 2012, incidentally, astronomers analyzing HARPS data announced the discovery of a roughly Earth-size world around the star Alpha Centauri B, but later work suggested that the putative planet does not actually exist.)
Spacecraft traveling at 20 percent the speed of light could make the trip to Alpha Centauri in about two decades, as opposed to thousands of years for conventionally powered probes.
Proxima Centauri lies just 0.24 light-years from Alpha Centauri, and is regarded by some scientists as part of the latter system — so Breakthrough Starshot team members are recalibrating possible mission profiles a bit now.
"With today's announcement, we now know that there's at least one planet, the one orbiting Proxima Centauri, that has some characteristics similar to the Earth," Pete Worden, chairman of the Breakthrough Prize Foundation, said during a news conference today.
"Over the next decade, we will work with experts here at ESO and elsewhere to get as much information as possible about the Proxima Centauri planet, perhaps as noted, even including whether it might bear life, prior to launching mankind's first probe towards the star," Worden added. "We also hope to obtain similar data about the other nearby stars, Alpha Centauri A and B."
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UFO Sighting Over Small Arizona City On Aug 20, 2016, Video, UFO Sighting News.
