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This is a personal review of various issues related to massive photometric and astrometric searches. A complete inventory of variable stars down to almost any magnitude limit will improve our understanding of the stellar evolution and the…
Some atmospheric gases have been proposed as counter indicators to the presence of life on an exoplanet if remotely detectable at sufficient abundance (i.e., antibiosignatures), informing the search for biosignatures and potentially…
The first detected member of a new astronomical class is often not representative of the underlying population, but instead reflects the selection effects of the observing technique that found it. We apply this idea to the first remote…
Warm rocky exoplanets within the habitable zone of Sun-like stars are favoured targets for current and future missions. Theory indicates these planets could be wet at formation and remain habitable long enough for life to develop. In this…
This chapter reviews proposed exoplanet biosignatures, including their biological origins, observable features, atmospheric sinks, and potentially confounding abiotic sources. Emphasis is placed on material published since past…
The search for exoplanetary life must encompass the complex geological processes reflected in an exoplanet's atmosphere, or we risk reporting false positive and false negative detections. To do this, we must nurture the nascent discipline…
Upcoming NASA astrophysics missions such as the James Webb Space Telescope will search for signs of life on planets transiting nearby stars. Doing so will require co-adding dozens of transmission spectra to build up sufficient signal to…
This article reviews the emerging field of exo-geoscience, focusing on the geological and geophysical processes thought to influence the evolution and (eu)habitability of rocky exoplanets. We examine the possible roles of planetary…
Earth's future detectability depends upon the trajectory of our civilization over the coming centuries. Human civilization is also the only known example of an energy-intensive civilization, so our history and future trajectories provide…
By the 2040s, the exoplanet field will have moved from the discovery of a few thousand planets to hundreds of thousands, thanks to Gaia DR5, TESS, PLATO, Roman, and their successors. At that stage, the key bottleneck will no longer be…
Oxygen is a promising exoplanet biosignature due to the evolutionary advantage conferred by harnessing starlight for photosynthesis, and the apparent low likelihood of maintaining oxygen-rich atmospheres without life. Hypothetical scenarios…
We present an analytic model to estimate the capabilities of space missions dedicated to the search for biosignatures in the atmosphere of rocky planets located in the habitable zone of nearby stars. Relations between performance and…
Recent discoveries of potentially habitable exoplanets have ignited the prospect of spectroscopic investigations of exoplanet surfaces and atmospheres for signs of life. This chapter provides an overview of potential surface and temporal…
The frequency of planets in binaries is an important issue in the field of extrasolar planet studies because of its relevance in the estimation of the global planet population of our galaxy and the clues it can give to our understanding of…
Oxygen is a well-studied biosignature. Studying potential abiotic pathways for O2 build-up in exoplanet atmospheres is essential for evaluating whether the detection of O2 would constitute a biosignature detection on other worlds. Previous…
The Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) aims to characterize habitable exoplanets in search of signs of life. However, detectable life may be rare, either because abiogenesis is intrinsically contingent and unlikely, or because biospheres…
We use the critical step model to study the major transitions in evolution on Earth. We find that a total of five steps represents the most plausible estimate, in agreement with previous studies, and use the fossil record to identify the…
Ocean-atmosphere chemistry on Earth has undergone dramatic evolutionary changes through its long history, with potentially significant ramifications for the emergence and long-term stability of atmospheric biosignatures. Though a great deal…
The search for extrasolar Earth-like planets is underway. Over 100 extrasolar giant planets are known to orbit nearby sun-like stars, including several in multiple-planet systems. These planetary systems are stepping stones for the search…
The last 25 years have been revolutionary in astronomy, as the field of exoplanets has gone from no known planets outside the Solar System to thousands discovered over the last year few years. This represents a rapid increase not just in…