Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Virtual twin of Earth's sun, pure-tone signal from space and ‘Moons of Jupiter’

Welcome! “Alien Life” tracks the latest discoveries and thoughts in the various elements of the famous Drake Equation. You may notice that this and future entries are shorter than usual; Career, family and book deal commitments have forced me to cut back some of my projects. Now, here’s today’s news:
g Stars - Members of a research team led by the University of Colorado at Boulder have used NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory to peer at the embryo of an infant star in the nearby Eagle Nebula, which they believe may someday develop into a virtual twin of Earth's sun. See http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0702/18sunlike/.
g Abodes - NASA scientists may have discovered how a warmer climate in the future could increase droughts in certain parts of the world, including the southwest United States. See http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0702/12droughts/.
g Intelligence - Children as young as 6 months old have detailed memories that can persist for a year or more, researchers reported at a conference in San Francisco. See http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-20070217-00575600-bc-us-memory.xml.
g Message - What would be a sign of alien intelligence? Forget mathematics — try a simple, pure-tone radio signal. See http://
www.space.com/searchforlife/seti_artificiality_part2_030220.
html
.
g Learning - Here’s a neat classroom activity: “Moons of Jupiter.” In this lesson plan, students build model rovers to learn about engineering and evidence of alien life. See http://www.adlerplanet
/
arium.org/education/teachers/plans/alien/Lesson_Plan.pdf.