Quoting the famous phrase from the movie classic ‘Jurassic Park’, ” life makes its way “, and in every corner of our planet we can give an account of it.
There are organisms that survive in water scarcity, extreme cold or heat, high altitudes, and even under radioactive conditions. Therefore, scientists are optimistic about the imminent discovery of life in some corner of the known cosmos.
And despite the incredible adaptability of living organisms that we observe on Earth, of course, we will have to start somewhere. That is why the objective of space explorations in search of life is to look for planets as similar to Earth as possible (exo-Earths) , or places (such as satellites of other planets) that can emulate similar conditions, or environments that already exist. on Earth itself.
Since the search for planets began in the 1990s, most of those that have been discovered are of the gaseous type (a priori, discarded). Instead, there are a handful of worlds with conditions very similar to those on Earth, which keep scientists hopeful. Rocky planets, of a similar size and gravity, and in the habitable zone of their star; many of them with atmospheres and some, capable of holding water in a liquid state. Let us remember that the environment is the place where the original soup of life originated, at least here on Earth.
Oceans under ice, seas of ethanol, microorganisms in the heat of pulsating stars with very high radiation … The possibilities are many, and each planet with favorable conditions for life is one more candidate for the collection of the list of habitable worlds, than each year fattening due to the powerful telescopes, space probes and detection methods that astronomers possess.
Aliens in our own neighborhood
The usual thing when considering the possibility that there is life (intelligent or not) outside the Earth is to think of distant and unknown planets. But very close, around the corner, there are interesting candidates. As close almost as if we were talking about the garden of our own house, in our Solar System, there are moons with many possibilities of being habitable. Although the planes that host these satellites are off the radar of the ‘habitable world’, because they are gaseous planets like Jupiter and Saturn, some of their moons are presented as very promising candidates.
And, as close as 39 light-years away (in our same neighborhood) planetary systems like Trappist-1 are guardians of possible living worlds.
Finding life, whatever it is, will be the beginning of a new era in space exploration and will also lead to a deep reflection on the existence of human beings and our insignificance in the universe. Finding it will mean that life is probably frequent and that we, no matter how special we think we are, are nothing more than a fleeting coincidence.
Now let’s review some of those worlds, satellites, planets and other types of corners, where there could be life.
