A Serious Search for Other Worlds, Life, and - Maybe - Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence

Searching the stars for "new life and new civilizations" is the stuff of science fiction. And, to an increasing extent, the job of professional scientists.

We're living at a point in history where humanity is rapidly discovering new worlds: some so strange that scientists are having to change old assumptions, and develop new models to explain what their instruments detect.

I would be very surprised if my children's children see something like Star Trek's warp drive. On the other hand, Alcubierre's intriguing equations suggest that we'll be able to travel faster than the speed of light: as soon as we figure out how to build machines that can warp space-time on a fairly large scale.

Meanwhile, astronomers and others are putting together an increasingly extensive list of places to check out; and physicists are exploring the horizon of their field, speculating on how a practical interstellar spaceship could be designed:

• "Mars Rover Breakdown Leads to New Data"
  (December 23, 2009)
• "Probable Super-Earths Found: One Nearby"
  (December 14, 2009)
• "Spectacular UFO and the Norwegian Space Centre
  (December 11, 2009)
• "How to Handle Mars Rocks"
  (December 5, 2009)
• "Earth May Not Be a 'Class M' Planet"
  (December 5, 2009)
• "Kids, Try This at Home: Man's Search for Aliens Got Him Fired"
  (December 2, 2009)
• "Water - On the Moon?!"
  (November 15, 2009)
• "Low on Lithium? If the Star's the Size of the Sun: It's Probably Got Planets"
  (November 11, 2009)
• "Very Young Planetary System: HR 8799"
  (November 11, 2009)
• "Space Aliens, the News, and Those Catholics"
  (November 11, 2009)
• "Space Aliens, Stars, Scientists, and This is Where I Came In"
  (November 5, 2009)
• "NASA Studying Recipe for a Planet"
  (October 29, 2009)
• "The Caves of Mars"
  (October 26, 2009)
• "Another Hot Jupiter With Organic Compounds"
  (October 21, 2009)
• "Water, Water Everywhere - Even on the Moon - Again"
  (September 28, 2009)
• "Left-Handed Life: Why are We So Sinister?"
  (September 17, 2009)
• "Bee Communication and Non-Human Intelligence; And a Dying Planet"
  (August 28, 2009)
• "Bugs in Space, Day 2: or, Stop Earthlings Now!"
  (August 26, 2009)
• "Planets, Stars: What's the Difference? Good Question"
  (August 17, 2009)
• "Life on Other Worlds: Evolution, Orbits, and the Galactic Environment"
  (August 13, 2009)
• "Planets Collided - Recently - Around a Star Called HD 172555"
  (August 10, 2009)
• "Oceans on Venus; a Very Long Time Ago; Maybe"
  (July 15, 2009)
• "Wet Mars: New Evidence"
  (July 1, 2009)
• "Bottom of the South Pacific: 1,000 Times Less Lively"
  (June 23, 2009)
• "Ancient Lake on Mars - Maybe"
  (June 20, 2009)
• "Warp Drive Might Not Be Stable: Physcisists Take Another look at Alcubierre's Work"
  (June 12, 2009)
• "When Worlds Collide: You Wind Up With a Hot Planet"
  (June 11, 2009)
• "Exoplanets With Water: Blue Clue"
  (June 1, 2009)
• "Warp Drive: Yes, it May Be Possible; But Don't Hold Your Breath"
  (May 7, 2009)
• "Gliese 581: Lightest Known Expoplanet (Caution! Geeky Content!) "
  (April 21, 2009)
• "SETI and More: Scientific Progress Goes 'BOINC' "
  (April 18, 2009)
• "Red Dwarf Stars: Not the Undesirable Real Estate We Thought?"
  (April 9, 2009)
• "DNA - A Universal Pattern? Could Be"
  (April 8, 2009)
• "Life is Left-Handed on Earth (Caution: Geeky Content)"
  (March 23, 2009)
• "Life on Ceres? Could Be"
  (March 5, 2009)
• "Exoplanets - Wired's Top Five Most Extreme"
  (January 27, 2009)
• "Gliese 581 c: Closest Match to Earth Outside the Solar System"
  (January 15, 2009)
• "Planets Circling Other Stars Photographed"
  (November 13, 2008)
• "Re-Thinking This Galaxy's Habitable Zone"
  (September 23, 2008)
• "The Purple Hills of Earth?"
  (September 6, 2008)
• "Faster-Than-Light Travel: Maybe"
  (August 14, 2008)
• "Diamonds: Ancient Crystals, New Speculation, and the Origin of Life"
  (July 28, 2008)
• "Earth: Filmed as an Alien World"
  (July 19, 2008)
• "Mars: Water? Probably; Life? Eventually"
  (July 17, 2008)
• "Phoenix Mars Lander: Looking for Life as We Know it"
  (June 12, 2008)
• "Life on Mars as a Threat - No Kidding"
  (June 8, 2008)
• "'Thar's Ice in Them Thar Plains!' - Maybe"
  (June 1, 2008)
• "Mars, Mostly"
  (May 29, 2008)
  (Routinely updated list of posts about Mars)
• "Serious Discussions of Warp Drive"
  (May 24, 2008)
• "Vatican Says: 'Belief in Aliens Doesn't Contractict Faith' "
  (May 14, 2008)
• "The Sun as a Swinger? Cardiff U's Title is Better for Mass Extinction Article"
  (May 12, 2008)
• "Interstellar Travel: Difficult, yes; Impossible; No - NASA"
  (April 30, 2008)
• "SETI at Home: A Serious Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence"
  (March 29, 2008)
• "Methane in Extrasolar Planet's Atmosphere: A First"
  (March 21, 2008)
• "Rocky Planets May be Common as Dirt"
  (February 18, 2008)
• "A Serious Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence: A New Wrinkle in the Maxwell Equations"
  (January 31, 2008)
• "Plate Tectonics, CO2, and Life on Other Planets"
  (January 13, 2008)
• "What Would a Galactic Empire be Like? 'The Physics of Extraterrestrial Civilizations' "
  (January 2, 2008)
• "Galactic Empires and the One Percent Rule"
  (December 10, 2007)
• "Galaxies and Grocery Lists: Keeping Life in Perspective"
  (November 22, 2007)
• "And Now for Something Completely Different: New Planets: Three Hot, One Not"
  (November 8, 2007)
• "Habitable Planets, a Rand Report"
  (August 23, 2007)