From The MPG Institute for Astronomy [MPG Institut für Astronomie] (DE) Via “phys.org” : “Astronomers find rare Earth-mass rocky planet suitable for the search for signs of life”
MPG Institut für Astronomie (DE)
From The MPG Institute for Astronomy [MPG Institut für Astronomie] (DE)
Via
2.3.23
Dr. Markus Nielbock
Press and public relations officer
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Heidelberg
+49 6221 528-134
pr@mpia.de
Dr. Diana Kossakowski
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Heidelberg
kossakowski@mpia.de
Dr. Martin Kürster
Leitung der technischen Abteilungen
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Heidelberg
+49 6221 528-214
kuerster@mpia.de
Artist’s conception of a rocky Earth-mass exoplanet like Wolf 1069 b orbiting a red dwarf star. If the planet had retained its atmosphere, chances are high that it would feature liquid water and habitable conditions over a wide area of its dayside. Credit: Daniel Rutter/NASA/Ames Research Center.
A newly discovered exoplanet could be worth searching for signs of life. Analyses by a team led by astronomer Diana Kossakowski of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy describe a planet that orbits its home star-the red dwarf Wolf 1069 in the habitable zone.
This zone includes distances around the star for which liquid water can exist on the surface of the planet. In addition, the planet named Wolf 1069 b has an Earth-like mass. Very likely, this planet is a rocky planet that may also have an atmosphere. This makes the planet one of the few promising targets to search for signs of life-friendly conditions and biosignatures.
When astronomers search for planets outside our solar system, they are particularly interested in Earth-like planets. Of the more than 5000 exoplanets they have discovered so far only about a dozen have an Earth-like mass and populate the habitable zone, the range in a planetary system where water can maintain its liquid form on the planet’s surface. With Wolf 1069 b, the number of such exoplanets on which life could have evolved has increased by one candidate.
A planet with eternal day and night
Detecting such low-mass planets is still a major challenge. Diana Kossakowski and her team at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg have taken on this task. As part of the Carmenes project, an instrument was developed specifically for the search of potentially habitable worlds. The Carmenes team is using this apparatus at the Calar Alto Observatory in Spain.
“When we analyzed the data of the star Wolf 1069, we discovered a clear, low-amplitude signal of what appears to be a planet of roughly Earth mass,” says Diana Kossakowski. “It orbits the star within 15.6 days at a distance equivalent to one-fifteenth of the separation between the Earth and the sun,” The results of the study have now been published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics [below].
Simulated surface temperature map of Wolf 1069 b, assuming an Earth-like atmosphere. The map is centered at point that always faces the star. The temperatures are given in Kelvin. 273.15 Kelvin corresponds to zero degree Celsius. Liquid water would be possible on the planet’s surface inside the red circle. Credit: Kossakowski et al (2023) / MPIA
According to the study, the surface of the dwarf star is relatively cool and thus appears orange-reddish. “As a result, the so-called habitable zone is shifted inwards,” Kossakowski explains. Despite its close distance to the central star, the planet Wolf 1069 b therefore receives only about 65% of the incident radiant power of what Earth receives from the sun. These special conditions make planets around red dwarf stars like Wolf 1069 potentially friendly to life.
In addition, they may all share a special property. Their rotation is probably tidally locked to the orbit of its host star. In other words, the star always faces the same side of the planet. So there is eternal day, while on the other side it is always night. This is also the reason why we always face the same side of the moon.
Climate simulations for exoplanets
If Wolf 1069 b is assumed to be a bare and rocky planet, the average temperature even on the side facing the star would be just minus 23 degrees Celsius. However, according to existing knowledge, it is quite possible that Wolf 1069 b has formed an atmosphere. Under this assumption its temperature could have increased to plus 13 degrees, as computer simulations with climate models show. Under these circumstances, water would remain liquid and life-friendly conditions could prevail, because life as we know it depends on water.
An atmosphere is not only a precondition for the emergence of life from a climatic point of view. It would also protect Wolf 1069 b from high-energy electromagnetic radiation and particles that would destroy possible biomolecules. The radiation and particles either stem from interstellar space or from the central star. If the star’s radiation is too intense, it can also strip off a planet’s atmosphere, as it did for Mars. But as red dwarf, Wolf 1069 emits only relatively weak radiation.
Thus, an atmosphere may have been preserved on the newly discovered planet. It is even possible that the planet has a magnetic field that protects it from charged stellar wind particles. Many rocky planets have a liquid core, which generates a magnetic field via the dynamo effect, similar to planet Earth.
Illustration that compares three exoplanet systems of red dwarf stars hosting Earth-mass planets. The green rings indicate the individual habitable zones. Credit: J. Neidel/ MPIA graphics department.
The difficult search for Earth-mass exoplanets
There has been immense progress in the search for exoplanets since the first of its kind was discovered 30 years ago. Still, the signatures that astronomers look for to detect planets with Earth-like masses and diameters are relatively weak and hard to extract from the data. The Carmenes team is looking for small periodic frequency shifts in the stellar spectra. These shifts are expected to arise when a companion pulls on the host star by its gravity, causing it to wobble. As a result. the frequency of the light measured on Earth changes due to the Doppler effect.
In the case of Wolf 1069 and its newly discovered planet, these fluctuations are large enough to be measured. One of the reasons is that the mass difference between the star and planet is relatively small, causing the star to wobble around the shared center of mass more prominently than in other cases. From the periodic signal, the mass of the planet can be estimated, as well.
Only a handful of candidates for future exoplanet characterization
At a distance of 31 light-years, Wolf 1069 b is the sixth closest Earth-mass planet in the habitable zone around its host star. It belongs to a small group of objects, such as Proxima Centauri b and Trappist-1 e, that are candidates for biosignature searches. However, such observations are currently beyond the capabilities of astronomical research.
“We will probably have to wait another ten years for this,” Kossakowski points out. The Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), currently under construction in Chile, may be able to study the composition of the atmospheres of those planets and possibly even detect molecular evidence of life.
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The MPG Institute for Astronomy campus, Heidelberg (DE)
The MPG Institute for Astronomy [MPG Institut für Astronomie] (DE) is a research institute of The MPG Society for the Advancement of Science [MPG Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaften e. V.] (DE). It is located in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany near the top of the Königstuhl, adjacent to the historic Landessternwarte Heidelberg-Königstuhl astronomical observatory. The institute primarily conducts basic research in the natural sciences in the field of astronomy.
In addition to its own astronomical observations and astronomical research, the Institute is also actively involved in the development of observation instruments. The instruments or parts of them are manufactured in the institute’s own workshops.
The founding of the institute in 1967 resulted from the insight that a supra-regional institute equipped with powerful telescopes was necessary in order to conduct internationally competitive astronomical research. Hans Elsässer, an astronomer, became the founding director in 1968. In February 1969, a first group of 5 employees started work in the buildings of the neighbouring Königstuhl State Observatory. The institute, which was completed in 1975, was initially dedicated to the preparation and evaluation of astronomical observations and the development of new measurement methods.
From 1973 to 1984, it operated the Calar Alto Observatory on Calar Alto near Almería together with Spanish authorities.
The Calar Alto Astronomical Observatory 3.5 meter Telescope, located in Almería province in Spain on Calar Alto, a 2,168-meter-high (7,113 ft) mountain in Sierra de Los Filabres(ES)
This largest observatory on the European mainland was used equally by astronomers from both countries until 2019. On 23 May 2019, the regional government of Andalusia and the MPG signed a transfer agreement for the 50% share in the observatory. Since then, it has been owned exclusively by Spain.
Since 2005, The MPG Institute for Astronomy has been operating the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) together with partners from Germany, Italy and the USA and equipping it with measuring instruments.
LBT-University of Arizona Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer, or LBTI, is a ground-based instrument connecting two 8-meter class telescopes on Mount Graham, Arizona, Altitude 3,221 m (10,568 ft.) to form the largest single-mount telescope in the world. The interferometer is designed to detect and study stars and planets outside our solar system. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech.
Two scientific questions are given priority at The MPG Institute for Astronomy. One is the formation and development of stars and planets in our cosmic neighborhood. The resonating question is: Is the Sun with its inhabited planet Earth unique, or are there also conditions in the vicinity of other stars, at least the numerous sun-like ones among them, that are conducive to life? On the other hand, the area of galaxies and cosmology is about understanding the development of today’s richly structured Universe with its galaxies and stars and its emergence from the simple initial state after the Big Bang.
The research topics at a glance:
• Star formation and young objects, planet formation, astrobiology, interstellar matter, astrochemistry
• Structure and evolution of the Milky Way, quasars and active galaxies, evolution of galaxies, galaxy clusters, cosmology
Together with the Center for Astronomy at The Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg [Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg](DE), the Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies (HITS) and the Department of Astro- and Particle Physics of the MPI for Nuclear Physics (MPIK), the MPIA in Heidelberg is a globally renowned centre of astronomical research.
Since 2015, the MPIA has been running the “Heidelberg Initiative for the Origins of Life” (HIFOL) together with the MPIK, the HITS, the Institute of Geosciences at Heidelberg University and the Department of Chemistry at The Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich [Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München](DE). HIFOL brings together top researchers from astrophysics, geosciences, chemistry and the life sciences to promote, strengthen and combine scientific research towards the prerequisites for the emergence of life.
Structure
• Galaxies and Cosmology Department
• Planet and Star Formation Department
• Atmospheric Physics of Exoplanets
• Technical Departments
Instrumentation
The MPIA also builds instruments or parts of them for ground-based telescopes and satellites, including the following:
• Calar Alto Observatory (Spain)[above]
• La Silla Observatory of the European Southern Observatory (The European Southern Observatory [La Observatorio Europeo Austral] [Observatoire européen austral][Europäische Südsternwarte](EU)(CL))
European Southern Observatory(EU) La Silla Observatory 600 km north of Santiago de Chile at an altitude of 2400 metres.
• Paranal Observatory and E-ELT (ESO)
The Paranal Observatory pictured with Cerro Paranal in the background. The mountain is home to one of the most advanced ground-based telescopes in the world, the VLT. The VLT telescope consists of four unit telescopes with mirrors measuring 8.2 meters in diameter and work together with four smaller auxiliary telescopes to make interferometric observations. Each of the 8.2m diameter Unit Telescopes can also be used individually. With one such telescope, images of celestial objects as faint as magnitude 30 can be obtained in a one-hour exposure. This corresponds to seeing objects that are four billion (four thousand million) times fainter than what can be seen with the unaided eye.
The European Southern Observatory(EU) ELT 39 meter telescope to be on top of Cerro Armazones in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile at an altitude of 3,060 metres (10,040 ft).
• Large Binocular Telescope [above]
• Infrared Space Observatory (The European Space Agency [La Agencia Espacial Europea] [Agence spatiale européenne][Europäische Weltraumorganisation](EU))
ESA Infrared Space Observatory.
• Herschel Space Observatory (ESA, The National Aeronautics and Space Agency)
European Space Agency Herschel spacecraft active from 2009 to 2013.
• James Webb Space Telescope (NASA, ESA.CSA)
National Aeronautics Space Agency/European Space Agency [La Agencia Espacial Europea] [Agence spatiale européenne][Europäische Weltraumorganisation](EU)/ Canadian Space Agency [Agence Spatiale Canadienne](CA) James Webb Infrared Space Telescope(US) annotated, finally launched December 25, 2021, ten years late.
The MPIA is also participating in the Gaia mission.
European Space Agency [La Agencia Espacial Europea][Agence spatiale européenne][Europäische Weltraumorganisation](EU) GAIA satellite.
Gaia is a space mission of The European Space Agency [La Agencia Espacial Europea] [Agence spatiale européenne][Europäische Weltraumorganisation](EU), in which the exact positions, distances and velocities of around one billion Milky Way stars are determined.
The MPG Society for the Advancement of Science [MPG Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaften e. V.](DE) is a formally independent non-governmental and non-profit association of German research institutes founded in 1911 as the Kaiser Wilhelm Society and renamed the Max Planck Society in 1948 in honor of its former president, theoretical physicist Max Planck. The society is funded by the federal and state governments of Germany as well as other sources.
According to its primary goal, the MPG Society supports fundamental research in the natural, life and social sciences, the arts and humanities in its 83 (as of January 2014) MPG Institutes. The society has a total staff of approximately 17,000 permanent employees, including 5,470 scientists, plus around 4,600 non-tenured scientists and guests. Society budget for 2015 was about €1.7 billion.
The MPG Institutes focus on excellence in research. The MPG Society has a world-leading reputation as a science and technology research organization, with 33 Nobel Prizes awarded to their scientists, and is generally regarded as the foremost basic research organization in Europe and the world. In 2013, the Nature Publishing Index placed the MPG institutes fifth worldwide in terms of research published in Nature journals (after Harvard University, The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University and The National Institutes of Health). In terms of total research volume (unweighted by citations or impact), the Max Planck Society is only outranked by The Chinese Academy of Sciences [中国科学院](CN), The Russian Academy of Sciences [Росси́йская акаде́мия нау́к](RU) and Harvard University. The Thomson Reuters-Science Watch website placed the MPG Society as the second leading research organization worldwide following Harvard University, in terms of the impact of the produced research over science fields.
The MPG Society and its predecessor Kaiser Wilhelm Society hosted several renowned scientists in their fields, including Otto Hahn, Werner Heisenberg, and Albert Einstein.
History
The organization was established in 1911 as the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, or Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft (KWG), a non-governmental research organization named for the then German emperor. The KWG was one of the world’s leading research organizations; its board of directors included scientists like Walther Bothe, Peter Debye, Albert Einstein, and Fritz Haber. In 1946, Otto Hahn assumed the position of President of KWG, and in 1948, the society was renamed the Max Planck Society (MPG) after its former President (1930–37) Max Planck, who died in 1947.
The MPG Society has a world-leading reputation as a science and technology research organization. In 2006, the Times Higher Education Supplement rankings of non-university research institutions (based on international peer review by academics) placed the MPG Society as No.1 in the world for science research, and No.3 in technology research (behind AT&T Corporation and The DOE’s Argonne National Laboratory.
The domain mpg.de attracted at least 1.7 million visitors annually by 2008 according to a Compete.com study.
MPG Institutes and research groups
The MPG Society consists of over 80 research institutes. In addition, the society funds a number of Max Planck Research Groups (MPRG) and International Max Planck Research Schools (IMPRS). The purpose of establishing independent research groups at various universities is to strengthen the required networking between universities and institutes of the Max Planck Society.
The research units are primarily located across Europe with a few in South Korea and the U.S. In 2007, the Society established its first non-European centre, with an institute on the Jupiter campus of Florida Atlantic University (US) focusing on neuroscience.
The MPG Institutes operate independently from, though in close cooperation with, the universities, and focus on innovative research which does not fit into the university structure due to their interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary nature or which require resources that cannot be met by the state universities.
Internally, MPG Institutes are organized into research departments headed by directors such that each MPI has several directors, a position roughly comparable to anything from full professor to department head at a university. Other core members include Junior and Senior Research Fellows.
In addition, there are several associated institutes:
International Max Planck Research Schools
International Max Planck Research Schools
Together with the Association of Universities and other Education Institutions in Germany, the Max Planck Society established numerous International Max Planck Research Schools (IMPRS) to promote junior scientists:
• Cologne Graduate School of Ageing Research, Cologne
• International Max Planck Research School for Intelligent Systems, at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems located in Tübingen and Stuttgart
• International Max Planck Research School on Adapting Behavior in a Fundamentally Uncertain World (Uncertainty School), at the Max Planck Institutes for Economics, for Human Development, and/or Research on Collective Goods
• International Max Planck Research School for Analysis, Design and Optimization in Chemical and Biochemical Process Engineering, Magdeburg
• International Max Planck Research School for Astronomy and Cosmic Physics, Heidelberg at the MPI for Astronomy
• International Max Planck Research School for Astrophysics, Garching at the MPI for Astrophysics
• International Max Planck Research School for Complex Surfaces in Material Sciences, Berlin
• International Max Planck Research School for Computer Science, Saarbrücken
• International Max Planck Research School for Earth System Modeling, Hamburg
• International Max Planck Research School for Elementary Particle Physics, Munich, at the MPI for Physics
• International Max Planck Research School for Environmental, Cellular and Molecular Microbiology, Marburg at the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology
• International Max Planck Research School for Evolutionary Biology, Plön at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology
• International Max Planck Research School “From Molecules to Organisms”, Tübingen at the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology
• International Max Planck Research School for Global Biogeochemical Cycles, Jena at the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry
• International Max Planck Research School on Gravitational Wave Astronomy, Hannover and Potsdam MPI for Gravitational Physics
• International Max Planck Research School for Heart and Lung Research, Bad Nauheim at the Max Planck Institute for Heart and Lung Research
• International Max Planck Research School for Infectious Diseases and Immunity, Berlin at the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology
• International Max Planck Research School for Language Sciences, Nijmegen
• International Max Planck Research School for Neurosciences, Göttingen
• International Max Planck Research School for Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience, Tübingen
• International Max Planck Research School for Marine Microbiology (MarMic), joint program of the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen, the University of Bremen, the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven, and the Jacobs University Bremen
• International Max Planck Research School for Maritime Affairs, Hamburg
• International Max Planck Research School for Molecular and Cellular Biology, Freiburg
• International Max Planck Research School for Molecular and Cellular Life Sciences, Munich
• International Max Planck Research School for Molecular Biology, Göttingen
• International Max Planck Research School for Molecular Cell Biology and Bioengineering, Dresden
• International Max Planck Research School Molecular Biomedicine, program combined with the ‘Graduate Programm Cell Dynamics And Disease’ at the University of Münster and the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine
• International Max Planck Research School on Multiscale Bio-Systems, Potsdam
• International Max Planck Research School for Organismal Biology, at the University of Konstanz and the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology
• International Max Planck Research School on Reactive Structure Analysis for Chemical Reactions (IMPRS RECHARGE), Mülheim an der Ruhr, at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Energy Conversion
• International Max Planck Research School for Science and Technology of Nano-Systems, Halle at Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics
• International Max Planck Research School for Solar System Science at the University of Göttingen hosted by MPI for Solar System Research
• International Max Planck Research School for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Bonn, at the MPI for Radio Astronomy (formerly the International Max Planck Research School for Radio and Infrared Astronomy)
• International Max Planck Research School for the Social and Political Constitution of the Economy, Cologne
• International Max Planck Research School for Surface and Interface Engineering in Advanced Materials, Düsseldorf at Max Planck Institute for Iron Research GmbH
• International Max Planck Research School for Ultrafast Imaging and Structural Dynamics, Hamburg
Max Planck Schools
• Max Planck School of Cognition
• Max Planck School Matter to Life
• Max Planck School of Photonics
Max Planck Center
• The Max Planck Centre for Attosecond Science (MPC-AS), POSTECH Pohang
• The Max Planck POSTECH Center for Complex Phase Materials, POSTECH Pohang
Max Planck Institutes
Among others:
• Max Planck Institute for Neurobiology of Behavior – caesar, Bonn
• Max Planck Institute for Aeronomics in Katlenburg-Lindau was renamed to Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in 2004;
• Max Planck Institute for Biology in Tübingen was closed in 2005;
• Max Planck Institute for Cell Biology in Ladenburg b. Heidelberg was closed in 2003;
• Max Planck Institute for Economics in Jena was renamed to the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in 2014;
• Max Planck Institute for Ionospheric Research in Katlenburg-Lindau was renamed to Max Planck Institute for Aeronomics in 1958;
• Max Planck Institute for Metals Research, Stuttgart
• Max Planck Institute of Oceanic Biology in Wilhelmshaven was renamed to Max Planck Institute of Cell Biology in 1968 and moved to Ladenburg 1977;
• Max Planck Institute for Psychological Research in Munich merged into the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in 2004;
• Max Planck Institute for Protein and Leather Research in Regensburg moved to Munich 1957 and was united with the Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry in 1977;
• Max Planck Institute for Virus Research in Tübingen was renamed as Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology in 1985;
• Max Planck Institute for the Study of the Scientific-Technical World in Starnberg (from 1970 until 1981 (closed)) directed by Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker and Jürgen Habermas.
• Max Planck Institute for Behavioral Physiology
• Max Planck Institute of Experimental Endocrinology
• Max Planck Institute for Foreign and International Social Law
• Max Planck Institute for Physics and Astrophysics
• Max Planck Research Unit for Enzymology of Protein Folding
• Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing
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