Over 121 planets are surrounded by tiny moons. And strangely, this number of moons is the best candidate for sustaining life.
It is quite normal to find new planets outside the solar system, especially with today’s technological capabilities. However, recently scientists have excited many people with just over 100 new planets.
The problem is, these planets are all in the habitable zone with their host star. In particular, these planets have quite a few moons around, and experts say it is very likely that that very number of moons is the roof of aliens.
Specifically, experts from the University of California, Riverside (United States) and the University of South Queensland (Australia) used data from the Kepler Telescope and found 121 new planets. Most are three times the size of Earth and all have giant moons as satellites. In addition, it is these moons that have the greatest potential to support life.
“There are approximately 175 unidentified moons, orbiting eight planets in the solar system,” said Stephen Kane, associate professor of astrophysics.
“Most are satellites of Saturn and Jupiter – that is, beyond the habitable zone of the system. But with other star-planet systems in the universe, things will be different.”
“If we include extrasolar moons (exomoons) among the objects that could harbor life, we will have a lot of options.”
The Kepler Telescope is known to have been operating since 2009 and has identified thousands of planets beyond the solar system. However, according to experts, it is possible that we have been wrong so far, because what we need to observe are the moons revolving around them.
As a result, exomoons are probably better candidates, as they receive energy directly from the host star and reflected energy from the orbiting planet.
The only problem here is that we have not been able to confirm the existence of exomoons. This is why this study was carried out, in order to restrict the search to only 121 planets that may contain moons.
“We already have a database of giant planets in the habitable zone. Now it’s just a matter of looking at possible exomoons to confirm that,” said Michelle Hill, University of Queensland-born fellow. from South.
“The following studies will provide information that will help us design a new generation of periscopes in the future, with the aim of making the search for life easier.”
