Stars Being Scouted For Ideal Habitable Zone Conditions By Chandra X-ray Telescope

Space.com

The Chandra X-ray telescope and other observatories are being used to study stars that could potentially harbor habitable planets. Future observatories will use the data to narrow down the list for possible Earth-like planets to image.   Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Hobart

Transcript

00:00Music

00:04Visit Chandra's beautiful universe.

00:08Exoplanet Study

00:12Using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and ESA's XMM-Newton,

00:16astronomers are testing how habitable exoplanets are based on whether they receive

00:20lethal radiation from the stars they orbit.

00:24This type of research will help guide observations with the next generation of telescopes

00:28aiming to make the first images of planets like Earth.

00:32A team of researchers examined stars that are close enough to Earth that telescopes

00:36set to begin operating in the next decade or two could take images of planets

00:40in their so-called habitable zones, defined as orbits where the planets

00:44could have liquid water on their surfaces.

00:48Any images of planets will be single points of light and will not directly show

00:52surface features like clouds, continents, and oceans.

00:56However, their spectra, the amount of light at different wavelengths,

01:00will reveal information about the planet's surface composition and atmosphere.

01:04There are several other factors influencing what could make a planet

01:08suitable for life as we know it. One of those factors is the amount of

01:12harmful X-rays and ultraviolet light they receive, which can damage or even strip

01:16away the planet's atmosphere. A team of astronomers began

01:20with a list of stars that are close enough to Earth that future ground and space

01:24telescopes could make images of planets in their habitable zone.

01:28These future telescopes include the Habitable Worlds Observatory and

01:32ground-based Extremely Large Telescopes. Based on X-ray

01:36observations of some of these stars using data from Chandra and XMM Newton,

01:40the researchers examined which stars could have hospitable conditions

01:44on orbiting planets for life to form and prosper.

01:48The team studied how bright the stars are in X-rays, how energetic the X-rays

01:52are, and how much and how quickly they change in X-ray output.

01:56For example, due to flares.

02:00Brighter and more energetic X-rays can cause more damage to the atmospheres

02:04of orbiting planets. They identified stars where the habitable zone's

02:08X-ray radiation environment is similar to or even milder than the

02:12one in which Earth evolved. Such conditions may play a key role

02:16in sustaining a rich atmosphere like the one found on Earth.

02:20Observing time on the next generation of telescopes will be precious and

02:24extremely difficult to obtain. These X-ray data are helping to refine

02:28and prioritize the list of targets and may allow the first image

02:32of a planet like the Earth to be obtained more quickly.

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