Discovered Planet Zarmina (Gliese 581g) Is 'Habitable' For Human Life

[Kiev Communard]

It seems the scientists have just confirmed the discovery of a new planet around Gliese 581 star, this time within its habitable zone.





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwNMg5JB_ic&feature=player_embedded

The first ever planet outside the solar system that may be able to support human life had been discovered by astronomers.

It is in the middle of the star's habitable zone, meaning that temperatures on its surface are just right for life to develop.

Gliese 581 has been under study for more than a decade through the Keck telescope in Hawaii by scientists.

Gliese 581 g or Gl 581 g is one of at least six extrasolar planets found around Gliese 581, an M3V red dwarf star approximately 20.5 light-years away from Earth in the constellation of Libra.

The planet lies near the middle of the Goldilocks zone, or habitable zone of its parent star, and the presence of liquid water is considered a strong possibility.The discovery of Gliese 581 g was announced in September 2010, and is believed to be the first Goldilocks planet ever found, the most Earth-like planet, and the best exoplanet candidate with the potential for harboring life found to date.

The planet was detected using radial velocity measurements combining the data from the HIRES instrument of the Keck 1 telescope and the HARPS instrument of ESO's 3.6m telescope at La Silla Observatory. The planet is believed to have a mass of three to four times that of the Earth and an orbital period of just under 37 days.

Steven Vogt, the co-discoverer, unofficially named the planet "Zarmina", after his wife.

Gliese 581 g is tidally locked to its star, just as our moon is to the Earth; the length of Gliese 581g's day precisely matches the length of its year. With one side of the planet always facing the star, continuous Earth-like temperatures are imaginable in the area between the bright and the dark side. Its mass indicates that it is probably a rocky planet with a definite surface and that it has enough gravity to hold on to an atmosphere. Researchers have estimated that the average surface temperature of the planet is between −31 to −12 degrees Celsius (−24 and 10 degrees Fahrenheit).

In an interview, co-discover Steven Vogt claimed "the chances for life on this planet are almost 100 percent.” However, he said this on a strictly personal basis, stating that he was an astronomer and not a biologist.

http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/6893170-discovered-planet-gliese-581g-is-habitable-for-human-life


Definite breakthrough for exoplanetology, I've thought that they would find something Earth-like perhaps in thirty to forty years but now... this. It is likely to be one of the greatest astronomical dosciveries of all times. With such temperature range and gravity the unicellular lifeforms definitely thrive here, but whether the advanced life exists on this planet is pretty much open question.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

It would be really great if we could get a spectrographic analysis of planets like this in order to determine atmospheric composition.

This would tell us whether the atmosphere has completely frozen out on the night side (thus making it unsuitable for life as we know it), or whether it possesses a dynamic atmosphere that can circulate the heat from day side to night side (making it much more suitable for life as we know it) or something else entirely.

[Kiev Communard]

It would be really great if we could get a spectrographic analysis of planets like this in order to determine atmospheric composition.

This would tell us whether the atmosphere has completely frozen out on the night side (thus making it unsuitable for life as we know it), or whether it possesses a dynamic atmosphere that can circulate the heat from day side to night side (making it much more suitable for life as we know it) or something else entirely.

If they managed to discern the average surface temperature, I think it may be possible to determine the character of its atmosphere as well.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

If they managed to discern the average surface temperature, I think it may be possible to determine the character of its atmosphere as well.

I think the average temperature figures are derived from planetary distance from the stellar primary - this can be misleading.

[Kiev Communard]

I think the average temperature figures are derived from planetary distance from the stellar primary - this can be misleading.

Here is what New Scientist says about it:




Conditions on the planet would be very different from those on Earth. The host star is a low-mass red dwarf that is just 1 per cent as bright as the sun.

Because it puts out so little light and warmth, its habitable zone lies much closer in than does the sun's. At such tight distances, planets in the zone experience strong gravitational tugs from the star that probably slow their rotation over time, until they become "locked" with one side always facing the star, just as the moon always keeps the same face pointed towards Earth.

That would mean perpetual daylight on one side of the planet and permanent shadow on the other. A first approximation suggests the temperature would be 71 °C on the day side and -34 °C on the night side, though winds could soften the differences by redistributing heat around the planet.

Travelling from one side of the planet to the other, there would be a range of intermediate temperatures, says Vogt. "The most comfortable place on this planet … is along what we call the terminator, the line between light and dark," he says. "You basically see the star sitting on the horizon – you see an eternal sunrise or sunset."

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19519-found-first-rocky-exoplanet-that-could-host-life.html



Bearing in mind that temperatures on Earth is far more extreme (-94 in Antarctica or +71 in Sahara Desert), Earth-like life (of what we could term extremophile variety) could most certainly exist there without any significant problems.

[Salyut]

Lemme quote Phil Plait who is awesome:

There are some things we can speculate on with some solid footing. The orbital period of 37 days puts it pretty close to the star – since the star is a red dwarf, it’s cooler than the Sun, so being closer doesn’t necessarily mean you overheat. But it does mean the star exerts strong tides on the planet, which have the effect of slowing the planet’s rotation until it equals the orbital period. This has almost certainly happened to this planet, so in other words, one day on this planet = one year, and the planet always shows the same face to its star like the Moon does to the Earth.
That makes things a bit dicier for habitability. The side facing the star may get very hot, while the dark side gets very cold. If the planet has an atmosphere that gets mitigated somewhat (the hot air on the day side will flow over to the night side and vice versa, smoothing out the highs and lows in temperature), and may make the planet more clement. However, we have no clue if this planet has an atmosphere at all.
I also want to note that the mass found (3x Earth) is the minimum mass of the planet! It may be more massive, though it’s unlikely to be much more. The Doppler method doesn’t give an exact mass, only a lower limit. That’s frustrating, but that’s the way the math works out.

That being said I'm optimistic. :D

[Kiev Communard]

Lemme quote Phil Plait who is awesome:


That being said I'm optimistic. :D

It seems they have addressed the issue of temperature ranges on the day side and night side, as I noted in the previous posts. The different lifeforms on Earth could actually survive under such temperatures - think Antarctica and Sahara, for instance.

[EvilRedGuy]

First Goldilocks planet ever discovered. Interesting. :thumbup1:

[Amphictyonis]

It would be really great if we could get a spectrographic analysis of planets like this in order to determine atmospheric composition.

This would tell us whether the atmosphere has completely frozen out on the night side (thus making it unsuitable for life as we know it), or whether it possesses a dynamic atmosphere that can circulate the heat from day side to night side (making it much more suitable for life as we know it) or something else entirely.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope

That's what the James Webb will do. Kepler has also found hundreds of potential earth size planets. Exciting times indeed.

[The Fighting_Crusnik]

It's cool that they discovered this but... I think there is a good chance that if the technology become available, and there is highly intelligent life... the imperialists would try to enslave the planet...

[Q]

It's cool that they discovered this but... I think there is a good chance that if the technology become available, and there is highly intelligent life... the imperialists would try to enslave the planet...

By the time we have starships, we must have communism, don't you watch startrek? ;)

The chances of finding life that is even remotely comparable to us, in fysiology and intelligence, is rather remote though. More likely they're either bacteria or seeming deities that don't notice nor care about monkeys passing their lawn.

[AK]

More likely they're either bacteria
What are the chances that life on other planets and their moons would be cellular or even resemble anything that we know at all if it was cellular?

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

What are the chances that life on other planets and their moons would be cellular or even resemble anything that we know at all if it was cellular?

I'd say they are pretty high. Cells are the smallest units of life, they define the seperation between an organism and its environment, and they provide an essential support network for molecular replicators (which in the case of alien life may not be based on DNA).

[Salyut]

I still say we'll find a dyson sphere before we catch a signal - unless the Benford Beacons turn out to be real.

[The Fighting_Crusnik]

Well, since someone cited Star Trek, if you're a fan, you know that the reason most of the aliens are humanoid is due to an ancient species of alien that went emo and spread its dna throughout the cosmos :D So in that case, humanoid life forms could pretty easy to find.

[Q]

Well, since someone cited Star Trek, if you're a fan, you know that the reason most of the aliens are humanoid is due to an ancient species of alien that went emo and spread its dna throughout the cosmos :D So in that case, humanoid life forms could pretty easy to find.

Well, I know that TNG episode and that is really somewhat of a stretch ;)
Like Noxion pointed out earlier, there only has to be a 0.001% variety over such a big time (if I remember correctly, said species in TNG was billions of years old) to still cause a difference between the early stone age (50 000 years ago) or a hyper advanced civilisation (50 000 years from now). That is still dicarding the major influence of environmental factors on the course of evolution.

The Stargate method of spreading humans across the galaxy through slavetrade is much more logical.

[The Fighting_Crusnik]

Well, if this planet has the same atmospheric composition of earth, then that would almost have to mean that the life on it is similar. My reasoning for this is that Earth did not always have this atmosphere that we have. But because of simple organisms, the Earth became what it is now. Either way, we'll just have to wait and see. According to a national science foundation video, it would take several generations to get a satellite there and then 200 years from that point for the data to be sent back to Earth. Hopefully, technology will advance as it has been doing so that we can maybe send something there except for a human in our lifetimes. But hell, Europa may have life swarming in it. So why not send a satellite with a drill there to see.:lol:

[Red Commissar]

With a name like "Zarmina" there'd better be some freaky stuff or I'll be disappointed. Seriously, what an odd name for a person.

[The Fighting_Crusnik]

lol, maybe we'll find a planet that is centuries ahead of us and have a full functioning socialist-like government. :) lol, I'd love to see how the conservotards, especially Glenn Beck, take to that. :laugh:

[Nolan]

lol, maybe we'll find a planet that is centuries ahead of us and have a full functioning socialist-like government. :) lol, I'd love to see how the conservotards, especially Glenn Beck, take to that. :laugh:

We must spread democracy to the stars!

[Black Sheep]

Imagine that we do discover that it's inhabited, and it has communism as well.

edit:
hah, the posadists would be all like "HAH I TOLD U SO "

[Stand Your Ground]

This is good but also very bad. I was hoping we wouldn't find another planet until humanity is good enough to take care of it, unlike what we have done to Earth.

[Q]

This is good but also very bad. I was hoping we wouldn't find another planet until humanity is good enough to take care of it, unlike what we have done to Earth.

Well, it's 20 lightyears away from us. Practically that's way out of reach.

[Crux]

Let's not rule out the "made of marshmallows" hypothesis.

[Razor]

With a name like "Zarmina" there'd better be some freaky stuff or I'll be disappointed. Seriously, what an odd name for a person.

Seems to be a popular Pakistani name if you Google. Why odd? :rolleyes:

"Zameen" is Urdu/Persian for earth. Could be a fitting name.

[mikelepore]

In an interview, co-discover Steven Vogt claimed "the chances for life on this planet are almost 100 percent.” However, he said this on a strictly personal basis, stating that he was an astronomer and not a biologist.

It was irresponsible for a science professor to make such a comment at a press conference. There is a complete lack of data about how difficult it is for a living structure to develop out of nonliving matter.

[ContrarianLemming]

considering that microscopic cells is classless and stateless..and it's surely going to have those at least...

the Posadists were right!
:lol:

[Stand Your Ground]

Well, it's 20 lightyears away from us. Practically that's way out of reach.
I'm sure they'll do everything they can to try to get to it.

[maskerade]

it really trips me out that earth-like planets are so rare in our universe. i mean, the chances of all of this having taken place is so small....

earth is just a big cosmic joke

[ContrarianLemming]

it really trips me out that earth-like planets are so rare in our universe. i mean, the chances of all of this having taken place is so small....

earth is just a big cosmic joke

the articles on the subject suggests that earthy planets are now probably rather common, finding like 5 possibile habitable planets reletively close to home in such a short amount of time (20 years or so with the right tech) is actually either very very good luck or habitable planets are actually fraking everywhere, or at least far more common then thought.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

The occurrance of Earth-like planets in the universe depends on how strictly you define "Earth-like". A rocky planet is more "Earth-like" than a gas planet, while a rocky planet with water is more "Earth-like" than a rocky planet that is bone-dry.

[Red Commissar]

Seems to be a popular Pakistani name if you Google. Why odd? :rolleyes:

"Zameen" is Urdu/Persian for earth. Could be a fitting name.

I know. I was joking but it didn't come across very well. I was replicating some angry type comments that come up on yahoo comments and such. Why so serious?

Going back to the topic of the thread, it is good that in the past few years we have been finding more and more extrasolar planets, with the occasional one like this one coming up to be believed to habitable. At the rate this is going they should be finding a lot more now.

[Kiev Communard]

I'm sure they'll do everything they can to try to get to it.

But why should they bother? From the capitalist point of view, the space programme is completely unprofitable and could be used only for strictly military goals, being limited to LEO (Low Earth Orbit). Even Martian programme is deemed waste of resources, not speaking about interstellar flights. Consider this: http://www.technologyreview.com/business/25868/. Even the slightest space projects demand such formidable investments and entail such huge risks that the private capitalist sector would never take them.

[The Vegan Marxist]

But why should they bother? From the capitalist point of view, the space programme is completely unprofitable and could be used only for strictly military goals, being limited to LEO (Low Earth Orbit). Even Martian programme is deemed waste of resources, not speaking about interstellar flights. Consider this: http://www.technologyreview.com/business/25868/. Even the slightest space projects demand such formidable investments and entail such huge risks that the private capitalist sector would never take them.

Is NASA run by capitalist corporations though? Sure, the profit motive would play into how it's run, but this is only assuming that capitalist control revolves around NASA.

[gorillafuck]

I'm sure they'll do everything they can to try to get to it.
You think that mere determination could let us travel 20 lightyears in the near future?

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Is NASA run by capitalist corporations though? Sure, the profit motive would play into how it's run, but this is only assuming that capitalist control revolves around NASA.

NASA is (poorly) run by the US government, and it often undertakes research that has potential commercial and military applications. At least, that's how NASA justifies itself to the political classes.

The problem is that colonising a planet 20 light years away that we know hardly anything about will only bring benefits long after the patience of shareholders and the like has expired, and quite possibly long after such people have died of old age.

Interstellar colonisation, at least at first, will be a multi-generational venture.

[Kiev Communard]

Interstellar colonisation, at least at first, will be a multi-generational venture.


... And that's why it is impossible under capitalism with its maximization of profits imperatives. Personally I always laughed at those Western Sci-Fi authors who depict American-style capitalism in interstellar medium. All this "space empires / interstellar trade leagues" space opera is completely ahistorical.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

... And that's why it is impossible under capitalism with its maximization of profits imperatives. Personally I always laughed at those Western Sci-Fi authors who depict American-style capitalism in interstellar medium. All this "space empires / interstellar trade leagues" space opera is completely ahistorical.

Furthermore, it makes absolutely no sense from a resources/technology perspective; if you've got the technology to easily build interstellar craft, then you've automatically got the conditions for a post-scarcity society where nobody wants for any material things.

[Amphictyonis]

... And that's why it is impossible under capitalism with its maximization of profits imperatives. Personally I always laughed at those Western Sci-Fi authors who depict American-style capitalism in interstellar medium. All this "space empires / interstellar trade leagues" space opera is completely ahistorical.

Well, to be fair it was "the force" keeping it all together. The invisible hand? Without it the evil Empire ran amok. I imagine Jabba The Hut was a anarcho capitalist?

LOL

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Galactic_economy

[Theoneontheleft]

It's cool that they discovered this but... I think there is a good chance that if the technology become available, and there is highly intelligent life... the imperialists would try to enslave the planet...

If there is intelligent life out there, I would hope that we would let them live in peace and vice-versa, but unfortunately many bureaucrats do not share this opinion.

[Kiev Communard]

If there is intelligent life out there, I would hope that we would let them live in peace and vice-versa, but unfortunately many bureaucrats do not share this opinion.

I'd like to believe that, by the time humanity has had the ability to reach the stars, the capitalists and bureaucrats will have been just as obsolete as Egyptian Pharaohs or medieval knights.

[Stand Your Ground]

You think that mere determination could let us travel 20 lightyears in the near future?
Yes, that's exactly what I said. :rolleyes: I said try, they might die or fail in the process but they'll try.

[Luisrah]

Light takes 1,3 seconds to make the distance Earth-Moon.
It makes 8,3 minutes to make the distance Sun-Earth.
We are talking about 20 light years. Which means the light takes 20 years to come from that planet to Earth.

Light travels at 299 792,458 Km/s:)

Putting this in distance,
Earth-Moon - 38 973,19 kilometers (40 thousand km)
Sun-Earth - 149 296 644,1 kilometers (150 million km)

Now, there are 31 536 000 seconds in a year. :rolleyes:
You don't need to keep going if you already understood what I'm trying to say.

20 years means 630 720 000 seconds
20 light years mean ~ 1,89x10^14

or

189 085 099 100 000 km. Is that trillions? :lol:
Now, the fastest manned vehicle was Apollo 13, and it made 143,6392 Km/s (atleast this is what I found on the internet, but it seems strange to me)

That would mean...
Earth-Moon - 271.34 seconds (that's why it's strange)
Earth-Sun - 12 hours (but look at the huge difference)
But even being strange (because it's way too little time, atleast for what I expected) that would mean
20 light years - 1,31x10^12 seconds

or

(divided by 24 and by 60 two times)

15 237 047 days
or

41 745,3 motherfucking years

(if calculations are correct of course)

Conclusion - Not possible until a good bunch of development (either a super-duper discovery but still a lot of time, or a reeeeeeally long time)

( , represents decimal separation, I use the comma, but you may use the dot, it's the same thing)

[Luisrah]

As for possible life, well...

Some scientists think (and it is possible) that life on Earth might have come from somewhere else. Meteorites have been found that contained traces of bacteria.
If if happened with life on Earth, it could well have happened in other Earth-like planets.

If not, I'm actually expecting like somewhere else would be more similar to ours than we expect, for some very simple reasons.

A cell is a very, very simple form of life. It probably started with organized molecules or something like that. It is not far fetched to assume that a living form would be composed of cells if it is an ''effective'' way of organization.

The other reason is that living beings, when confronted with the same circumstances, develop towards the same. For example, if you make a normal dog start living in the desert (for example), imagining he would survive and develop, he would develop towards having short fur, long tail, mouth and ears, because that's the best way to loose heat.

So there is a great possibility that you will find animals there (if there are animals) with legs, or skales, or eyes (or something that works like that) in the sense of what they are supposed to do.
For example, they might have skales made of metal, but they are still there to protect form other animals.
This can actually be a bit understood by studying materialism. If a living being is to have interactions with others, or with what surrounds him (that he must in order to survive) it must have some way to have ''sensations'', for without them, life wouldn't be possible, right?
Plants turn to the sun if they are put in a not-so-well lit room, and animals wouldn't survive if they didn't have an accurate representation of the surrounding world.
Even cells that eat each other must know when to strike, and where is the prey, etc.

And if this is true, then some similarities must exist between them and us.
If there are animals, certainly they will have something with which they will see, hear etc. If they have advanced brains, they will probably have fear as a defense mechanism, hunger, thirst, pleasure, etc.

But there might not even be animals. They may just be living being that don't move, like plants. Or something completely different. There is much more difference between two sorts of bacteria (eubacteria and arqueobacteria) than between you and a snail, or a plant actually.
Millions of years ago, there were just unicellular beings, and they started to differ. Some ate others or got food from somewhere, and others made their food with the help of light. Now, there is a huge difference between us and plants.

And that was after bacteria and arqueobacteria got separated, so imagine what they would be if they had become macroscopic.

So there is the possibility that they haven't developped much, that they have developped a lot but are just microscopic as we have very advanced bacteria (I know it's strange to believe that, but it's true), or they have absolutely nothing to do with what we know (in case they aren't made of cells) or they are very different (their cells are different from ours like the arqueobacteria), or they could have actually some elements in common.

[Tatarin]

Meteorites have been found that contained traces of bacteria.

I thought that was just what may look like traces of bacteria? Especially if you mean that rock from Mars, which as far as I know scientists are still unsure of.

[Luisrah]

I thought that was just what may look like traces of bacteria? Especially if you mean that rock from Mars, which as far as I know scientists are still unsure of.

Maybe I was wrong, but I remember seing it in a documentary and they developed so much around it that I think it was traces of bacteria.

But you never know. Anyway it's not something you can exclude right?

[Tatarin]

Maybe I was wrong, but I remember seing it in a documentary and they developed so much around it that I think it was traces of bacteria.

Well, I think you should take many documentaries with a grain of salt. :) Specially the American ones on History Channel.


But you never know. Anyway it's not something you can exclude right?

Of course not. Unless there is hard evidence against that possibility, I believe it is possible. The thing is that it would be quite big news, even the notion of something that may come from elsewhere than this world would be like saying that we may soon have evidence that there is life "out there". And I think the scientific community would be all over it to finally prove or disprove it.

[Axle]

This really is interesting news, if slightly irrelevant without means to get there.

At the very least we know we COULD colonize space.

[chegitz guevara]

It was irresponsible for a science professor to make such a comment at a press conference. There is a complete lack of data about how difficult it is for a living structure to develop out of nonliving matter.
Given that life arose on Earth almost as soon as the conditions for it were right, I'd say it's probably very easy.

[chegitz guevara]

Now, the fastest manned vehicle was Apollo 13,

We already have the technology to make vehicles go at 1/10th light speed, so Glise would be 200 years away. That's just using nuclear bombs as thrust. With a practical ion drive that time could probably be cut.

[Luisrah]

We already have the technology to make vehicles go at 1/10th light speed, so Glise would be 200 years away. That's just using nuclear bombs as thrust. With a practical ion drive that time could probably be cut.

Has that ever been put into practice? Why hasn't anyone gone to Mars then?

I'm not really informed about this kind of news.

[Salyut]

We already have the technology to make vehicles go at 1/10th light speed, so Glise would be 200 years away. That's just using nuclear bombs as thrust. With a practical ion drive that time could probably be cut.

The 400m interstellar Orion had a travel time of 100 years to Alpha Centauri.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Has that ever been put into practice? Why hasn't anyone gone to Mars then?

I'm not really informed about this kind of news.

I believe chegitz guevara is talking about the ORION Drive (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_%28nuclear_propulsion%29). The reasons it hasn't happened yet are political, not technical - it is effectively powered by nuclear bombs. ORION is something you could plausibly build with 1960s technology.

I don't know why he was talking about ion drives though, since they are low-thrust drives and always will be (http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3c2.html#ion). Hence, ion drives, while extremely efficient, will take ages to get anywhere.

[Amphictyonis]

F8bM8K7W_R8

I'm not sure where he gets to the meat and potatoes, I think around the 8 min mark? Early 2011 they will release some solid information.

[chegitz guevara]

I don't know why he was talking about ion drives though, since they are low-thrust drives and always will be (http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3c2.html#ion). Hence, ion drives, while extremely efficient, will take ages to get anywhere.

They take forever to get up to speed, but they can get to near light speed.

[Tatarin]

Why hasn't anyone gone to Mars then?

Scientists haven't discovered any cheap labour on Mars... at least not yet...

[Revy]

Why the constant pessimism about extraterrestrial life? Bacteria...if there are oceans on the planet there is going to be a lot more than bacteria. A consensus has emerged that life on Earth developed merely out of a few chemical processes and reactions. Once that spark is there that gives you microscopic organisms, there's no stopping that evolutionary tidal wave. Just look at the history of life on Earth. It went from trilobites to T. Rex within a few hundred million years (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambrian_explosion).

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

The "pessimism" comes from the fact that for most of the Earth's existence as a viable home for life as we know it, bacteria were the most complicated things around.

Granted, that's a sample size of one out of a total that is unknown, but for a broad phenomenon such as life I think applying the Copernican principle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copernican_principle) will serve us well.

[Amphictyonis]

This really is interesting news, if slightly irrelevant without means to get there.

At the very least we know we COULD colonize space.

I don't think finding an earth size planet in the habitable zone is irrelevant even if it was in the Andromeda galaxy :) It's amazing news!

[Theoneontheleft]

This might seem slightly off-topic, but here are some web-sites dedicated to the theoretical possibilities of terraforming other planets.

http://www.newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5493

http://www.rfreitas.com/Astro/TerraformSRS1983.htm

http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/48e77e52e27f8

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

This might seem slightly off-topic, but here are some web-sites dedicated to the theoretical possibilities of terraforming other planets.

http://www.newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5493

http://www.rfreitas.com/Astro/TerraformSRS1983.htm

http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/48e77e52e27f8

Mars and Venus provide the ideal testbeds for any future terraforming techniques, which may serve us well if and when we ever get around to colonising planets around other stars.