If there is, then the Convection Rotation and planetary Transits (COROT) satellite will attempt to spot it. Space mission COROT blasted off from Baikonur Cosmodrome (which sounds a bit too much like an Eastern European Disco for my liking) and will journey beyond the Solar System to find out if there are any other planets like ours that might be able to support life. COROT will scrutinise more than 100,000 stars, and look for fluctuations in their brightness that might indicate the transit of a planet. It'll then study the internal conditions of the stars by looking at 'starquakes' - variations in the star's light caused by sound waves rippling across the surface. The plan will then be to return to these stars in the future with more sophisticated instrumentation to look for signatures of life, but at the moment the scientists just want to know what sort of planets might be out there. COROT's first port of call is the Milky Way, then it's off to Orion to continue its hunt for extra-terrestrial life.
More via BBC News here. (PHOTO: MWOOKIE)
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COROT's first port of call is the Milky Way? Aren't we IN the Milky Way already? And how long is it going to take to get to Orion? This seems like a very long term and very exciting project... will we get the benefits in our lifetimes?
Posted by: messiestobjects | January 07, 2007 at 10:01 AM