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 Abodes - The chance of detecting life outside our own solar system probably is greater than discovering it on neighboring planets and moons like Mars or Europa, a moon of Jupiter, according to a University of Colorado at Boulder professor. See article.
g Cosmicus - A NASA-funded robotic vehicle has plunged into the mysterious depths of Mexico's El Zacatón sinkhole and returned information about the unique forms of life that inhabit its waters. The robot may one day help in the search for life beyond our planet by taking the plunge into the oceans of Europa. See http://www.astrobio.net/news/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=2352&mode=thread&order
=0&thold=0.
g Learning - Don’t quite know what a word you’ve come across in an astrobiology article means? Here’s a handy glossary: http://www.aao.gov.au/local/www/jab/astrobiology/glossary.html.
g Aftermath - Book alert: Prolific author Peter Ward offers a series of speculations in "Life As We Do Not Know It..." The book contains a wealth of information and dazzling speculation drawn from the ranks of Ward's colleagues in the 16 research institutions that operate worldwide as NASA's Astrobiology Institute. See http://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/plaindealer/index.ssf?
/base/entertainment/11317915804040.xml&coll=2.
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The Drake Equation
This formula estimates the number of intelligent civilizations in our galaxy.N=(R*)(Ns)(Fp)(Ne)(Fl)(Fi)(Fc)(L)
Where:- N = Number of civilizations we can communicate with
- R* = Average star formation rate
- Ns = Percentage of stars capable of supporting earth-like planets
- Fp = Percentage of those stars with planets
- Ne = Average umber of planets in those stars' habitable zones
- Fl = Percentage of those planets where life begins
- Fi = Percentage of planets with life where an intelligent species evolves
- Fc = Percentage of those intelligent species that develop communication technology
- L = Average lifetime, in years, of a civilization that develops such technology
About Me
- Rob Bignell
- I'm the owner and chief editor at Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the editing and proofreading needs of writers both new and published. For more than two decades, I worked as an award-winning journalist, with half of those years spent as an editor. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres have been published, and I am the author of the nonfiction “Hikes with Tykes” series, a novel "Windmill", and a collection of poetry, "Love Letters to Sophie's Mom". For seven years I worked as an English teacher or a community college journalism instructor. I hold a master's degree in English and a bachelor's in journalism and English.