Atmosphere of SuperEarth GJ1214b - Eliza Kempton (SETI Talks)

SETI Talks archive: http://seti.org/talks

Astronomers currently know of over 500 planets orbiting distant stars beyond the confines of our solar system. Of these 500 "extrasolar" planets, most are large gas-rich planets, similar to Jupiter or Saturn. However, more recently, due to improvements in discovery techniques and instrumentation, astronomers have started to discover much smaller extrasolar planets, which are only slightly larger (or more massive) than the Earth. This new class of planets, which have masses of 1-10 times that of the Earth, have come to be known as super-Earths. Super-Earths are particularly interesting because planets in this mass range are not present in our solar system, and they therefore represent a fundamentally new class of planets for astronomers to study. Recently, the first observations of a super-Earth's atmosphere were obtained. They reveal a unique planetary atmosphere that may bear some similarities to objects in our solar system but requires further study.
In this talk Dr. Kempton will begin by presenting an overview of extrasolar planet research, focusing in on what we know about super-Earths. She will then move on to describing what we know about extrasolar planet atmospheres. She will finish by revealing the first observations of the atmosphere of a super-Earth, and she will explain some of the challenges to interpreting these observations.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Eliza Kempton
• seti institute
• carl sagan
• exoplanets
• exoplanet
• super earth
• superearth
• gj1214b

[Mikaelaxo1]

I wonder how many from Seti have watched movie Contact.. atleast the narrator reminded me of that maincarracter. What comes to the data in here, i wonder how much recearch does Seti put in engineering these devices and how much interpreting information given by them? Space is huge, is it necessery to manually search each solarsystems form, encluding other particles that transit informaton from cosmos - otherwords, can this do automaticly?

[setiinstitute]

@Mikaelaxo1 I think 100% of people at SETI have seen the movie or read the Carl Sagan book 'Contact'. If you'd like to earn more about how the SETI search is carried out, google 'SETI Talks Beacons' and 'SETI Talks ATA'

[TheTripp09]

I am so grateful for these posts thanks! My father was an Astronomy professor. He died in 1995 before most of the exciting discoveries in extrasolar planets occurred. I often wonder what he would say about these discoveries.

[setiinstitute]

@TheTripp09 Our pleasure to bring them to you - we have more extrasolar planets talks in the works!

[drmoroe30]

Close your eyes and listen to the dude giving the introduction- it's Murray from FOTC.

Cheer up Murray, don't let um get ya down!

[setiinstitute]

@drmoroe30 Murray Hewitt is a Kiwi though, and this guy is an Aussie. Close your eyes and listen to the 'i's and 'e's and you'll hear the difference. Thanks for the feedback!

[macschomo]

The sensitivity of detection capabilities are unbelievable. I see every SETI postings and it gets preciser more and more. This is transparency in science. I wish German institutes would make the same work. And the Germans get money from the tax payers. So they must make their great work more visible, like SETI makes it visible. And you guys don't get money from the state. So THANKS...

[Icix1]

awesome thanks seti

[OVO1009]

Gay

[Zurround100]

as big a challenge as finding extraterrestrial life is an even bigger challenge would be to find a life form from another world that is more pleasing to the eye than the carbon based life form that is narrating this video.

[idanieltube]

Extremely interesting talk with amazing statistics. I cannot imagine how difficult it must be to measure a 1% or less "dimming" of a star so unimaginably far away. It must be fascinating to study exoplanets and now I'm waiting to hear the news of the first exoearth!

[paultheastronomer]

To many uhh's and ahh's making me loose concentration.