Study pinpoints some of the chemical signs of microbial life on Enceladus. The study could in part be corroborated by Cassini’s flyby of the moon.
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Articles on Extraterrestrial life
Displaying 101 - 120 of 132 articles
The chance that Kepler has spotted construction of a Dyson sphere are very low but it could also be the ruins of such a structure.
There’s a lot of speculation about a star behaving strangely in our galaxy. But even if it’s not evidence of alien intelligence, it’s sure to be an amazing discovery.
NASA has set a target date of 2030 for a manned mission to Mars. With no real scientific breakthroughs needed, success depends on developing the proper technology.
Water on Mars could mean life on Mars. But how do we explore it without destroying it?
New research suggests that salty water exists on Mars in the summer months. But that wouldn’t be the first time we hear of water on the red planet. So what’s new and what isn’t?
Ice is everywhere in the solar system and there may even be liquid water beneath the surface of a number of planets. But could we ever get to it?
The Parkes radio telescope is part of the US$100 million search for life elsewhere in the universe, but the investment will also benefit other space research at The Dish.
For centuries, scientists have wondered how water channels on Mars formed. Our model suggests that they were caused by water erupting from subsurface lakes on the ancient planet.
It was the first probe to find water on Mercury, the planet closest to the sun. Its mission nearly over, MESSENGER is about to crash into the planet it’s been observing.
One of the crucial variables in calculating the likelihood that alien life exists elsewhere in our galaxy is the number of stars that possess planetary systems, and the proportion of those planets that…
More than 1,000 exoplanets have now been discovered by the Kepler Space Telescope, announced NASA this month, and the figure continues to climb. Three of the newly confirmed Kepler planets are thought…
When it comes to finding the right kind of planet to target in the search for life elsewhere in the universe, the size of the planet matters. All planets are believed to form by a process of competitive…
Every so often our Earth encounters a large chunk of space debris which reminds us that our solar system still contains plenty of debris that could potentially have an impact on life on Earth. While the…
In the search for life beyond our solar system, we need to consider the system in which a planet moves, including the other planets and assorted debris that accompany it on its journey through the cosmos…
In the search for life-sustaining planets we must first choose the right host star. There are many factors that would make a star system too hostile for life to even get started, let alone survive for…
The criteria for life on other planets is the focus of the 4th Australian Exoplanet Workshop, hosted by the University of Southern Queensland this week. The first in this series on exoplanets looks at…
Astronomers have found thousands of exoplanets and the hunt is on for life beyond Earth. Once biological neighbors are identified, our planet’s philosophies and religions will need to adapt.
The Conversation organised a public question-and-answer session on Reddit in which Seth Shostak, senior astronomer at the SETI Institute, explained why searching for intelligent life is so important and…
While alien life can be seen nightly on television and in the movies, it has never been seen in space. Not so much as a microbe, dead or alive, let alone a wrinkle-faced Klingon. Despite this lack of protoplasmic…
Top contributors
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Professor of Planetary Geosciences, The Open University
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Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland
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Professor of Physics, Deputy Director (Solar System) at the Mullard Space Science Laboratory, UCL
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Professor of Planetary and Space Sciences, The Open University
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Lecturer, University of Southern Queensland
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Professor (Physics), University of Southern Queensland
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University Distinguished Professor of Astronomy, University of Arizona
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James Martin Research Fellow, Future of Humanity Institute & Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford
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Professor and Director of the Australian Centre for Astrobiology, UNSW Sydney
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Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Penn State
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Senior Instrument Scientist, Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation
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Senior research fellow, Curtin University
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Professor, School of Science, Western Sydney University
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PhD; Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory (retired) and Research Fellow, University of California, Davis
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Senior Astronomer, SETI Institute
