Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Current events: Another Earth!

There is a star known as Gliese 581 and its is ordinary in mostly every way possible. Gliese 581 is a red dwarf which is one of the most common stars in our galaxy. Gliese 581 is relatively nearby, it is 20 light years away.Yet 116 stars are closer than Gliese 581. But Gliese 581 does have just one special factor.A team of astronauts on Sept.29 declared that they had found two more planets circling this star bring up the total to 6 planets. Gliese 581g was one of the planets which was given a name, and it may be truly historic.This planet is found in what is called the "Goldilocks" Zone.The planet is far away enough from it's home star that the temperature is not to cold, yet it is close enough that it is not to hot. Meaning that the conditions are suitable for life a Gliese 581g is a lot like earth.

Probably having a solid surface and being in the "Goldilocks" Zones which allows temperature to be stable and making sure it is not so hot that water boils or so cold that it freezes. Gliese 581g looks pretty substantial for life. For thousands of years scientists have been searching for an earth like planet.And since 1995 they haven't another planet. But they don't know yet whether there is life on this planet. "We're pretty excited about it," admits Steve Vogt of the University of California at Santa Cruz, a member of the team that found the planet. "This is right next door to us. That's the big result."
I really like this article because when I was in 3rd grade we studied global warming and I got very worried that the earth would burn up and the human race would have nowhere to go. Yes, I now know that will logically probably not happen but it is nice to know that there is another planet that scientists have found. I think this ties into our unit about ecosystems very well because this planet is an ecosystem that is being studied. If you want to learn more about Gilese 581g go to: http://www.timeforkids.com/TFK/kids/news/story/0,28277,2023304,00.html

2 comments:

  1. MARIA!!!! THAT IS SO COOL!!!!!
    Wow!!! If we found a new uninhabited planet, that would open up a world of possibilities for mankind! Even if there are aliens on Gliese 581, it's an incredible discovery! Maybe, if there are, they could be as intelligent as us, and then they could teach us ways to construct buildings and things without causing global warming!!!!! (I know that it sounds impossible, but it could happen.)
    Also, if something like Wal-E happens to our planet, we'll have an alternative, so the whole human race, and all the animals of the world won't be destroyed! I'm not saying that we should litter as much as we want, but what we COULD do was move and breed endangered animals over on that planet. Many animals are losing homes and becoming extinct every minute, and that's really bad. We could bring a couple males and females from Earth over there to raise the kids up in safety. We could save many species of otherwise extinct animals!!!!! That is a truly amazing discovery. If there aren't any forms of intelligent life on that planet, I hope that we don't go over there, dump our factories on that land, and start polluting that world, because we definitely don't need more stuff, and it's just not fair for the planet itself.

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  2. Nice article! I agree with you- the fact that I was scared too. When I was reading this article it reminded me of 2012 (end of the world) Don't ask me why because I have no clue. Maybe because of the star, Gliese 581 and stuff.. .
    Anyways, you summarized everything well
    Keep it up! :)

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