There may be more than 300 million habitable planets in the Milky Way
Tianwen Channel
Science and Technology Daily News (Siyang) October 29, according to foreign media reports, a new study based on data from the Kepler Space Telescope estimated that there may be as many as 300 million potentially habitable stars in our galaxy. planet.
Some of them may be very close to us, and some may be less than 30 light years away from the sun.
The results of this research were published in the Astronomical Journal and were completed by the cooperation of NASA, the SETI Research Institute and other scientists around the world.
"This is the first time that all the scattered information has been put together to provide a reliable measurement of the number of planets that may be habitable in the Milky Way." One of the authors of the paper, an exoplanet researcher at the Institute for the Search for Extraterrestrial Civilization, Kepler Jeff Coughlin, Director of the Office of Science, said, “This is a key element of the Drake equation, which can be used to estimate the number of extraterrestrial civilizations that may come into contact with us. On the long road of exploring extraterrestrial civilizations in the universe, we have One step closer."
The Drake equation details the factors to be considered when estimating the potential number of technologically advanced civilizations that may be detected in the galaxy.
The Drake equation is often regarded as a "road sign" for astrobiology, and it has provided help in searching for extraterrestrial civilizations.
In order to make a reasonable estimate, the researchers set their sights on rocky exoplanets similar in size to the Earth.
They also calculated so-called sun-like stars, which are about the same age as our sun and about the same temperature.
In addition, the researchers also calculated whether the planet has the necessary conditions to support liquid water.
Previous estimates of the number of potentially habitable exoplanets in the Milky Way were largely based on the distance between the planet and the host star.
However, in this latest study, the researchers also considered how much light the planet can receive.
In order to achieve this research goal, the research team not only used data from the Kepler Space Telescope, but also introduced data on how much energy the planet emits from the European Space Agency and the Gaia satellite.
It is precisely because of the introduction of a number of data that the research results can better reflect the diversity of stars, solar systems and exoplanets in the Milky Way.
"Understanding that planetary diversity is a very common phenomenon, which is of great value for the upcoming exoplanet search mission." One of the authors of the paper and a member of the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) team member Michel Guoyuan Said, "Such research results can increase the possibility of finding potentially habitable planets around sun-like stars."
The researchers said that more research is needed in the future to understand what role the planet's atmosphere can play in its retention of liquid water.
In this study, the researchers took a conservative estimate of the impact of the atmosphere on liquid water.
As of 2018, the Kepler Space Telescope, which has stopped data collection, has confirmed more than 2,800 exoplanets, and there are thousands of candidate planets to be confirmed.
So far, researchers have found hundreds of planets in the habitable zone of stars in the data of the Kepler Space Telescope. Finding all 300 million habitable planets will be a long journey.