We Are Not Alone In Universe, NASA Scientists Say

[E=mcsquared]

[h=1]We Are Not Alone In Universe, NASA Scientists Say[/h] The Huffington Post | By Sara Gates

Posted: 07/15/2014 4:56 pm EDT Updated: 07/15/2014 11:59 pm EDT
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It's highly unlikely we're alone in the universe, NASA experts are saying, and we may be close to finding alien life. In fact, it may happen in the next two decades.
NASA held a panel discussion at the agency's Washington headquarters on Monday, where space experts talked about the search for Earth-like planets that host life. Based on recent advancements in space telescope technology, scientists estimated that in the coming decades we'll confirm suspicions that we're not alone.
"I think in the next 20 years we will find out we are not alone in the universe," NASA astronomer Kevin Hand said in footage filmed at the discussion and posted on YouTube. Check it out in the video above.
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden echoed Hand's sentiment.
"It's highly improbable in the limitless vastness of the universe that we humans stand alone," he said.
Just this year, NASA's Kepler Space Telescope picked up on an Earth-like planet in the "habitable zone" of another star. At the time, the observation of the planet, Kepler-186f, was hailed as the first discovery of an Earth-size planet orbiting in the habitable zone of a star similar to our sun.
Scientists believe there are potentially many more Earth-like planets in the universe -- and some of them could be home to alien life.
"Astronomers think it is very likely that every single star in our Milky Way galaxy has at least one planet," Sara Seager, professor of planetary science and physics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said during the talk. "Sometime in the near future, people will be able to point to a star and say, 'that star has a planet like Earth.'"
With the expected launch of the James Webb Space Telescope in 2018, NASA's planet-hunting mission will get an extra boost. The new piece of equipment is designed to study infrared light, making it easier to spot extrasolar planets.
But NASA may need even larger and more powerful telescopes to discover alien life.
"To find evidence of actual life is going to take another generation of telescopes," Matt Mountain, director of the Space Telescope Science Institute, said at Monday's event. "And to do that, we're going to need new rockets, new approaches to getting into space, new approaches to large telescopes -- highly advanced optical systems."
Watch the full discussion about finding life beyond Earth, above.

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Source: We Are Not Alone In Universe, NASA Scientists Say

 

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NASA says discovering alien life in next 20 years is 'within reach'

By Eric Pfeiffer 7 hours ago The Sideshow

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An artist's illustration of NASA's 36-year-old ISEE-3 spacecraft near the moon. The private ISEE-3 Reboot Project …

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As NASA prepares to launch a powerful new satellite into space, a team of experts from America's space agency said it's increasingly likely that alien life will be discovered within 20 years.
In a posting on its site, NASA said the new research tools will show that "finding life beyond Earth is within reach."
"I think in the next 20 years we will find out we are not alone in the universe," NASA astronomer Kevin Hand said during a panel discussion at NASA's headquarters in Washington, D.C.
Hand pointed to growing evidence suggesting that some form of alien life may be in our own galactic neighborhood on Europa, one of Jupiter's moons that is home to massive amounts of water.
NASA announced that it plans to launch the Transiting Exoplanet Surveying Satellite and James Webb Space Telescope in 2017, which will work in conjunction with other existing technology to search for habitable, Earth-like planets within the Milky Way galaxy.
"Just imagine the moment, when we find potential signatures of life. Imagine the moment when the world wakes up and the human race realizes that its long loneliness in time and space may be over," added Matt Mountain, director and Webb telescope scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland.
So, why is NASA so confident that habitable worlds and alien life exist within our own galaxy?
"Sometime in the near future, people will be able to point to a star and say, 'That star has a planet like Earth'," said Sara Seager, professor of planetary science and physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts. "Astronomers think it is very likely that every single star in our Milky Way galaxy has at least one planet."
Based on those predictions, NASA believes that there could be literally 100 million planets within our own galaxy alone that could host life.
"What we didn't know five years ago is that perhaps 10 to 20 per cent of stars around us have Earth-size planets in the habitable zone," Mountain said during the panel discussion. "It's within our grasp to pull off a discovery that will change the world forever."


Space Experts Discuss the Search for Life in the Universe at NASA - YouTube




Source: NASA says discovering alien life in next 20 years is 'within reach'

 

[Bavaria]

I always believed this, there are people somewhere in the universe