Proxima Centauri has a planet in the goldilocks zone

[billdan]

This was reported on ABC news this morning, the new planet has an 11 day orbit and is approx 1.3 times the size of Earth.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-08-25/scientists-discover-earth-like-planet-proxima-centauri-b/7781096

Cheers
Bill

[bojan]

Source:
https://palereddot.org/proxima-b-is-our-closest-neighbor-better-get-used-to-it/

[04Stefan07]

Very exciting news! Now I have a close enough planet to consider when I retire :lol:

[astroron]

It might be the right distance for the so called goldylocks zone but the planet
would be sterile as it is very close to a very active Flair Star,which would make the CME's from our sun look a damp squib.
Over hype as far as I am concerned.
BTW this is the third time they have supposed to have found a planet around the Alpha Centurii system with nothing so far to show that it is real.
I really think they place to much score on the dopplar system.
Cheers :thumbsup:

[OffGrid]

How interesting. It seems that the writer producer of the Lost In Space TV series back in the early sixties had the same idea, as the plot was about a mission from an over populated Earth to a planet orbiting around Alpha Centauri.

That is, until the entire credible science fiction plot was utterly destroyed by the inclusion of a white ant character by the name of Dr Smith.

Shame, shame, shame, as in its time the series had the makings of an amazing sci fi story.
Maybe it's time to produce a new series or movie with a credible plot.

[Steffen]

Incidentally, East-German cartoonist Erich Schmitt published a cartoon series in a weekly paper back in 1956, describing a trip to a planet orbiting Proxima Centauri and featuring protagonist Karl Gabel and his German/Russian crew plus an idiosyncratic robot. The series saw several revisions, many editions to this day and a few sequels.

[bojan]

And how about Stanislaw Lem and his (never translated into English) "Magellanic Clouds"?
Very good story about travel to Alpha Centauri system.
BTW, a movie "Voyage to the End of the Universe" was made in former Czechoslovakia back in '63

[ZeroID]

I notice some of the papers have already hyped it into a 'habitable' planet instead in the 'habitable' zone.
It's fascinating to think that just if it was inhabited by some technologically progressed civilisation we could actually be in
communication within our own life spans.

'Hello?"
<please hold caller> 8 years later
"Sorry, wrong number "
<click>

[el_draco]

More likely, they'd have strick laws about spurious transmissions into space with the intent of avoiding any chance of discovery by the psychopathic aliens orbiting the third rock in the next system.... :eyepop:

[billdan]

Especially if they have been watching our TV shows ( when it was still analogue TV ) for the last 70 years.
They must think we are all nutcases.

[Atmos]

Listening to a quick interview done with Allan Duffy, he mentioned that it is tidally locked with its star... This be a very bad thing :/ If you have a planet with a significant enough atmosphere that is permanently light on one side and dark on the other, its windy! I don't just mean breezy, I mean 300km/h winds near all day every day!

Remember, thunderstorms and hurricanes are basically caused by hot and cold air mixing together ;)

[madbadgalaxyman]

As usual, we have a premature "science by news release" announcement of some big "discovery", such as "life could exist near Star X!" screaming from the newspaper headlines.

But wait a moment, didn't we learn in basic astronomy class that Proxima Cen is a flare star, subject to supergiant outbursts of high energy radiation, and thus arguably causing its near-star region to be inhospitable to life?

(Edit: oops. sorry, Ron. I hadn't realized you had already mentioned that Proxima is a flare star, so I forgot to credit you)

Well here is a good writeup of what is known about the nasty near-star environment of Proxima, due to its giant flares;

http://www.ifweassume.com/2016/08/flares-on-proxima-cen.html

Incidentally, this is an example of excellent science being done with a nifty micro-space-telescope of only 15cms aperture. The little Canadian 'scope is called MOST.

cheers,
galaxyman

Scientists unfortunately have reason to make these "big ticket" public announcements, lest they be beaten to the punch by another team, or because these big discoveries are nearly always leaked before the official announcement of the discovery is made. At worst, this becomes "science by press release"...... remember cold fusion? remember "life on Mars meteorite" screaming from the headlines?

[Atmos]

The issue these days is that we have a lot of good scientists that lack in the area of science journalism and "science" journalists that lack in the area of science :lol:
Plus, many people these days don't care too much unless it is sensationalised :/

[madbadgalaxyman]

Thanks for your comments , Colin,

Here is a good description of the enormous problems that the timing of the "Gravitational wave announcement" caused for the team who detected them:

203845


cheers,
Robert

I used to read this journal (Physics today) when I was at uni, often to the exclusion of the studies I was supposed to be doing! I now subscribe to it, as it is an extremely useful way to learn what physicists are discovering and doing..... for the scientifically-inclined non-physicist like me.
Also, a subscription was extremely inexpensive.

But these days I am much more likely to have my head in a plant science book or a book about eukaryotic microbes..... so I also have a subscription to "Science", which is the essential magazine for really understanding Life Science, biology, biomedical science, and the environmental/earth/atmospheric sciences; "Science" is very suitable for the "high-brow science aficionado" who is a non-specialist in these areas. (however, "Science" has very modest coverage of physics and astronomy)

[Atmos]

I wrote for From Quarks to Quasars (now Futurism) from not long after they formed back in 2012, did that for a number of years but ultimately life got in the way.

The Facebook page (and website) started going with the times and largely doing science journalism on recent events like every other one of those websites does. From the beginning I was starting to write a repository of explanatory articles on astrophysics, like a five part series on Gamma Ray Bursts (GRB) for instance. Over time these just didn't "rate" as well and current science news which I wasn't as interested in.