Related papers: Superhabitable Worlds
Proxima Centauri b, an Earth-size planet in the habitable zone of our nearest stellar neighbour, has just been discovered. A theoretical framework of synchronously rotating planets, in which the risk of a runaway greenhouse on the sunlight…
The search for exoplanets has revealed a diversity of planetary system architectures, the vast majority of which diverge significantly from the template of the solar system. In particular, giant planets beyond the snow line are relatively…
Recognizing whether a planet can support life is a primary goal of future exoplanet spectral characterization missions, but past research on habitability assessment has largely ignored the vastly different conditions that have existed in…
The Kepler data show that habitable small planets orbiting Red Dwarf stars (RDs) are abundant, and hence might be promising targets to look at for biomarkers and life. Planets orbiting within the Habitable Zone of RDs are close enough to be…
Stellar activity and planetary atmospheric properties have the potential to strongly influence habitability. To date, neither have been adequately studied in the multiverse context, so there has been no assessment of how these effects…
Since the discovery of the first confirmed exoplanet, observations have revealed a remarkable diversity of worlds. A wide variety of orbital and physical characteristics are detected in the exoplanet population, and much work has been…
The concept of Galactic Habitable Zone (GHZ) was introduced a few years ago as an extension of the much older concept of Circumstellar Habitable Zone. However, the physical processes underlying the former concept are hard to identify and…
Rocky planets orbiting M-dwarf stars are among the most promising and abundant astronomical targets for detecting habitable climates. Planets in the M-dwarf habitable zone are likely synchronously rotating, such that we expect significant…
The search for habitable planets has revealed many planets that can vary greatly from an Earth analog environment. These include highly eccentric orbits, giant planets, different bulk densities, relatively active stars, and evolved stars.…
Cold super-Earths which retain their primordial, H-He dominated atmosphere could have surfaces that are warm enough to host liquid water. This would be due to the collision induced absorption (CIA) of infra-red light by hydrogen, which…
The search for exoplanets has encompassed a broad range of stellar environments, from single stars in the solar neighborhood to multiple stars and various open clusters. The stellar environment has a profound effect on planet formation and…
The habitable zone (HZ) describes the range of orbital distances around a star where the existence of liquid water on the surface of an Earth-like planet is in principle possible. While 3D climate studies can calculate the water vapor, ice…
The detection of moons orbiting extrasolar planets ("exomoons") has now become feasible. Once they are discovered in the circumstellar habitable zone, questions about their habitability will emerge. Exomoons are likely to be tidally locked…
In this paper we discuss how we can read a planets spectrum to assess its habitability and search for the signatures of a biosphere. After a decade rich in giant exoplanet detections, observation techniques have now reached the ability to…
One primary reason for the formulation of the term Earth-like planet and the search for such planets in the galaxy is because life has arisen in such a world. Thus, this search seems justifiable as it is known here what one is looking for.…
M dwarf stars, which have masses less than 60 per cent that of the Sun, make up 75 per cent of the population of the stars in the Galaxy [1]. The atmospheres of orbiting Earth-sized planets are observationally accessible via transmission…
This paper outlines a simple approach to evaluate habitability of terrestrial planets by assuming different types of planetary atmospheres and using corresponding model calculations. Our approach can be applied for current and future…
Within the next few years, the first Earth-mass planets will be discovered around other stars. Some of those worlds will certainly lie within the classical "habitable zone" of their parent stars, and we will quickly move from knowing of no…
M dwarfs host most of the exoplanets in the local Milky Way. Some of these planets, ranging from sub-Earths to super-Jupiters, orbit in their stars' habitable zones (HZs), although many likely possess surface environments that preclude…
Based on numbers of stars, supernova rates, and metallicity, a prior study (Dayal et al. 2015) concluded that large elliptical galaxies contain up to 10,000 times more habitable planets than the Milky Way and are thus the "cradles of life".…