To Never Come Back

As a young boy, I cried whenever my balloon slipped out of my hands. With arms outstretched, and in tears, I hopelessly watched my balloon disappear into the clouds, wishing it would come back to me.

But now I was amazed when I saw my son intentionally let go of his balloons one by one, overjoyed by each launch. He giggles in joy as he watches them fly ever higher. And then he stands in silence as they fly out of sight in the blue expanse of the sky, imagining all the places it would go.

This striking contrast of attitude between two young boys a whole generation apart has dug up the concept of Interstellar Cyclers which I have read some time ago.

Interstellar Cyclers are starships that travel around in wide circles, lightyears in diameter, spanning multiple stars, that eventually comes back to their starting point for another round trip. This idea was fueled by the contention that "accelerating a starship, only to decelerate it again, is pure lunacy" as Karl Schroeder puts it in his essay. Thus he proposed what he unambiguously called 'Schroeder Cyclers', a starship that is "initially accelerated from the Earth or a colony star to some percentage of lightspeed, and then eventually serve as a way-station for travellers, who embark and disembark at star systems it passes along its route."

I was interested in the idea at first (which is a good idea in its own right), but later realized that I personally would prefer that the whole thing rather not go back. After I witnessed the scene of my little boy staring at his balloon disappearing into the clouds--the idea of accelerating a starship only to come back at its starting point became unthinkable. I realized that it was more evocative to see a starship leave, and know outright that it will never come back. It would go in a straight line, using all it's energy to accelerate ever faster, further, and farther into the great unknown.

It can, and will, still serve as a way-station, after accomplishing its cargo drop-off missions during flybys near other star systems. Among other things, it will also serve as a Subluminal Research Lab, but ultimately it will become a relic to be visited by future generations who would have, by then, developed more advanced technology to catch up with it, upgrade and maintain it, and then overtake it to continue the process of pushing the boundaries of space exploration.

That, to me is a true 'generation starship', a symbol of that spirit of exploration that will endlessly inspire the next generation to continue pushing onwards to the edge of the great unknown.

Links:
A New Kind of Starship
Cyclers: Transportation Network Among the Stars

Exoplanets, Extremophiles and other Kinds of Minds

Just a few days after I wrote a highly-speculative post outlining the relationship of lifeforms and planets, and the intriguing link between what other kinds of minds are possible for specific characteristics of planets--along comes these findings of bacteria that feel at home with hypergravity.

In the experiment, researchers spun E. coli and other bacteria in an ultacentrifuge and revved it up to its fastest speed, amounting up to something like 400,000 Gs. The bacteria not only lived through the "hypergravity" experience, they even reproduced.

So, on planetary scales, I can say that these bacteria can survive on the surface of a white dwarf with the same spherical size as earth but with the mass equivalent to the sun. The gravitational force on its surface is somewhere around 300,000 G.

So if I was beamed down (a la Star Trek) onto the surface of a cool white dwarf, upon materializing I would immmediately be crushed into a pancake-shaped goo. But some of the bacteria inhabiting my body will still survive the crushing gravity! And if some other conditions permitted (let's be generous by adding oxygen into the atmosphere, aside from temperate other imaginings), they will feed on my jello'ed body and who knows what will evolve from that mass of goo? Let’s settle on “flat” beings for now, by virtue of the flattening gravity of a white dwarf.

Now, “flat” beings with 2.5-dimensional brains wouldn’t evolve much cognitive capacity compared with other brains whose neurons utilize the 3 dimensions of space to connect and communicate with other neurons. Each of our brain’s neurons has an average of 7,000 synaptic connections with other neurons. Clearly, a flat-brained creature on a white dwarf would have a disadvantage over it’s counterparts from earth. But not so if it’s neurons are utilizing wi-fi! Yes, its still highly speculative but there’s been a study outlining the possibility of some bacteria-signaling via radio frequency. If this biomechanism works on another planet, the 7,000 synaptic "wired" connections of a human brain would pale in comparison with a creature whose 'neurons' work in wireless mode to process information collectively with other neurons. What kind of thoughts would it have?

Now, these two possible characteristics of microbial life--hypergravity survival and radio wave communications--that I've mentioned in this post are completely unrelated. I’ve simply fused them in a hypothetical scenario in a playful attempt to mash-up planetary characteristics with extreme-life biomechanisms to speculate on expanding the possibilities of life on other worlds. Rev up your imagination and try it yourself. It's actually fun!

With all the new findings on extremophiles, which comes at a perfect timing with new exoplanet discoveries, we are opening up a lot of incredible possibilities for the mind to speculate about life in other parts of the universe.

Links:
Alien Bacteria can Breed in Extreme Hypergravity
Electromagnetic Signals from Bacterial DNA (PDF)
From Planets To Consciousness: Other Kinds of Minds

Mergerburst

I love words that come from Astrophysics. A new one I learned today is "mergerburst". For that cinematic feel, make sure you pronounce it with an evil tone and a malevolent face, because a mergerburst is a highly-destructive event on a planetary scale.

This post is specifically about a BD-Planet mergerburst, the destruction of a planet by a brown dwarf (BD). When a massive planet approaches a brown dwarf, the poor planet will be tidally destroyed or shredded as it "merges" with a much-denser brown dwarf. The mayhem will form a luminous accretion disk around the brown dwarf that will stay for around a few days, which should be observable, distinct, and identifiable from other mergerbursts such as Star−Planet Mergerbursts, and Planet−Planet Mergerbursts.

Factoid: The existence of Brown dwarfs (BD) were predicted in 1963, and was termed as "black dwarfs" back then.

Links:
MERGERBURST TRANSIENTS OF BROWN DWARFS WITH EXOPLANETS (PDF)

The Earth was an Exoplanet

Did you know that the earth can be considered as an exoplanet? Well, that is if you look back in time (and space), in the distant past of the early earth, billions of years ago. During that time, our planet would not resemble anything close to our present day earth.

However, imagining how the earth was a few hundred millions of years ago may give us good insights in studying the habitability of exoplanets as well. And that is exactly what the Planetary Habitability Lab at the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo has done with their latest visualization, the Visible Paleo-Earth project.

Headed by Prof. Abel Méndez, the Visible Paleo-Earth project is a true-color visualization of the evolution of the Earth’s surface from paleo-climates to the present day. Using paleogeography and paleoclimate reconstructions combined with NASA satellite imagery, the team generated a global visual appearance of Earth in the last 750 million years, around the late Cambrian Period.

Now sit back and take a trip to the distant past by visiting The Planetary Habitability Lab as they present this project on Earth Day, April 22, 2011.

From Planets To Consciousness: Other Kinds of Minds

Alien Brain?

How does a planet influence the characteristics of its inhabiting lifeforms? Have you ever wondered how birds manage to navigate and reach their destination across thousands of miles? There's growing evidence that birds can "see" Earth's magnetic field and utilize it to find their way around. And bats do it too. In addition to their echolocation abilities, bats also use earth's magnetic field for orientation.

I am convinced that for each planetary property, there is a corresponding animal adaptation that utilizes that feature for survival. The planet's characteristics have a direct bearing on the evolution of the lifeforms inhabiting it.

And since we mentioned bats, the philosophical question "What's it like to be a bat?" is inescapable. How does it feel like to sense "magnetism'? Surely, additional sensations would affect the animal's perception of it's world. How would other additional sensations affect your thoughts? Can you imagine how it would be like if you could see in other wavelengths of light such as UV? Can you imagine how bees see the world?

If the dominant species with extra senses on another planet were to evolve a higher level of consciousness, what kind of mind will it have? What kinds of brains are possible on specific exoplanets? Could some animals here on Earth give us a glimpse of other "kinds of minds"?

Aside from magnetism, what other planetary properties (gravity, atmospheric density and pressure, temperature, etc) can lifeforms link their adaptations in order to survive? The amazing variety of extremophiles gives us ample room to speculate on this subject. If given a chance to evolve, what kinds of consciousness will extremophiles develop? Is a "hive mind" just one archetype among many types of consciousness?

This post can serve as a introductory teaser to the relationship between planets and consciousness. In addition to exploring speculations on what kinds of life are possible elsewhere, I would also explore what "kinds of minds" are possible on exoplanets. And I would tag it "Exonoology" (The Study of Alien Minds) perhaps as a branch of philosophy in the context of other worlds, or Exophilosophy.

Links:
Birds can see Earth's Magnetic Fields
Bats respond to Magnetic Fields
Magnetic fields influence the sleep–wake cycle of animals

Miracle

Just before we head out to the night, let's look a bit into the unknown, for that's where the incredible lurks. Yes, I am paraphrasing a famous quote of Carl Sagan that somewhere, something incredible is waiting...well, you know the rest.

More often than not, the things incredible are unseen--as is the case with more than five hundred exoplanets we have catalogued so far. We infer their existence by detecting their gravitational effects upon their host stars, and by sensing the minute dips of starlight reaching our telescopes.

Exoplanet discoveries are a daily dose of the incredible. These fascinating worlds were unknown just a mere fifteen years ago. But now we live in an incredible moment in history where we can point at the stars and say there’s a planet there, and there.

Yet all these discoveries can shake us to the core, and render us gasping for meaning even more. How do we make sense of all of it? So what?! So what, if there are billions of other worlds out there? So what, if other planets are teeming with life? Worlds and the prospect of exolife can blow our minds, but only up to a certain extent. Only for while, we bask in the knowledge that took humanity thousands of years to uncover, and then at the end of the day, life goes on as usual. We have a busy life to live. And life goes on...

...but sadly, life ends, in different ways, in different places. We are ephemeral partakers in the great churning of the earth.

For a few moments in our lives, we all get a taste of the awe and wonder of what has been revealed during our time, and afterwards we get that feeling of insignificance over our brief stay on this planet. Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle, a 16th century writer who wrote about the plurality of worlds, echoes that sentiment, "Behold a universe so immense that I'm lost in it. I no longer know where I am. I am just nothing at all."

Tonight, as you bask in the full torrent of human life, reflect on the Moment. And then give a hug to someone when you can, while you can.

I’d like to set a tone with pages from a soulful graphic novel, Daytripper. And i'll end this post with this thought: The Miracle is Everything, with you, here and now altogether.

The Exoscope

We are visual creatures. We want to understand things from the context of a larger view. And that is true with all the exoplanets we have known so far. How can you relate with these amazing orbs in a more direct way? When you look up in the night sky, where are the exoplanets?

{Drum roll}...The Exoscope.

The Exoscope is a web-based tool to enable you to see the locations of exoplanets in the sky. It's a tool for Exogazing, the activity of spotting stars with known exoplanets.

Exoscope is actually a spin of the awesome Chromoscope. The ability to change and blend the background to different wavelengths gives that dramatic feeling, and that is why I love Chromoscope so much!

The excellent developer, Stuart Lowe (@astronomyblog) and others did all the work to bring you that awesome goodness of chromoscope. I simply imported an exoplanet KML file, and the chromoscope engine did all the rest of putting the markers for the locations of the stars with known exoplanets.

Really, I didn’t do much. I just downloaded the chromoscope application (which is freely available) and added two lines of code to import the exoplanet KML and show the constellations by default. And that was it!

The hard work is actually up ahead. And that is how to always keep the exoplanet KML file updated.

I need help and ideas on how to generate the exoplanet KML file from the most updated source of exoplanet data, The Exoplanet Encyclopaedia. Also, I need some script to generate KML files from a CouchDB couchapp. So, if anyone can give leads on that regard, please ping me. For now, some info i can provide for whoever wants to take up the challenge is this: The developer of the most excellent exoplanet app for the iPhone/iPad (@exoplanetapp) has provided a digestible format of Jean Schneider’s exoplanet data, via The Open Exoplanet Catalogue. So, all I need is for someone to generate JSON data in addition to the XML files. I seriously need JSON so I can import them into my CouchDB exoplanet database app (which is also another work in progress).

Other tasks on the pipeline for this mini-project are:
1) How to center the field of view (FOV) on the exoplanet via a link from other sources (such as The Exoplanet Seeker). I like how WikiSky does it so i hope to implement the same thing.
2) How to host the image files into my own Amazon S3 account to ease the burden from Chromoscope.
3) How to add other stunning backgrounds
4) Cosmetic styling, and UX improvement for each exoplanet popup window (and how to pipe in data dynamically)

That’s it for now. I Hope that even while it’s still in progress, you’ll enjoy the stunning exoplanet landscape from The Exoscope!

Links:
Chromoscope
The Exoscope
Exogazing
The Open Exoplanet Catalogue
Exoplanet Encyclopedia

What To Do on an Interstellar Voyage: Subluminal Science

No doubt about it. Exoplanets have boosted humanity’s interest in interstellar travel. New discoveries got everyone thinking which exoplanets are good targets for the maiden voyage of the first exonauts.

Recently, DARPA and NASA set up a 100-Year Starship study. And the Tau Zero Foundation has renewed their efforts to carry us to the stars.

These initiatives are great. But now we need something to augment with these lofty plans. Even this early, we need to outline projects that future spacefarers must do during their maiden voyage. Let’s write up a ‘to do’ list to keep them busy. Because nobody wants to be nagged with “Are we there, yet?” especially on an interstellar journey.

That list would be huge, but it's narrowed down because of the unique characteristic of that starship--it’s traveling at a fraction of the speed of light! And that is how I got into thinking what science research I would do if I were on that starship.

I dub it “Subluminal Science”, a field of study which simply deals with the effects of relativistic speeds, whose experiments can only be done aboard an interstellar vessel traveling at some fraction of the speed of light. Subluminal, pertains to that step below Superluminal, or faster-than-light (FTL). Since matter cannot reach the speed of light, we’ll just explore subluminal for now. (if we upgraded to an Alcubierre drive instead, then we’d be doing Superluminal research. But that’s for another story)

The universe will ‘seem’ different from the vantage point of a moving or accelerating observer. And that makes it worthy of some curious thought. What do things look like when you're moving at even a small fraction, 0.1c of the speed of light? Can you imagine if we brought a portable version of the LHC on our subluminal starship? What manner of atom-smashing is possible with that scenario?

I know. Asking these questions is very silly. Such is the sacrifice i must bear to urge all of us to do some Gendanken experiments. What research are you going to do if you were given a chance to ride on that starship?

Here are some more prompts to give you an idea. Let me count the ways...

Let Theoretical physicists start thinking about physics at subluminal velocities. Would it be easier to detect gravitational waves if you were moving subluminally?

Let Neuroscientists start making predictions about the effects of subluminal speeds on cognition. I mean, really, what is the speed of thought?

Let Information Engineers start designing protocols for communicating with starships traveling at some fraction of the speed of light. What is the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of WiFi aboard that ship, anyways?

Let Cosmologists gauge the expansion of the universe. Would riding on the 100-Year Starship allow a more accurate measurement of the expansion of the universe? Would you be able to finally detect Dark Matter from that ship?

Let Quantum Physicists theorize how Quantum Computers would behave at subluminal speeds. Does entanglement still hold true when one of the pair is travelling at subluminal speeds?

Let Astronomers start dreaming up techniques that can be accomplished only when your telescope is moving so fast. Yes, you can still do planet-hunting from a moving platform, but how? Parallax methods? One thing is for sure: You’ll find new planets (and refine data on those previously known) from a different vantage point which would not have been possible solely from earth.

Oh the possibilities are endless! But you get the point, right? Those are just starter ideas behind the idea of Subluminal Science research. It can and must be applied to an unmanned probe too, for starters.

Don’t wait for DARPA or NASA. Don’t wait for Tau Zero or BIS to finish building that interstellar ship. Don’t wait for that day when your great great grandchildren zooms to Gliese and then realizes, “Hey, this trip is boring! What are we supposed to do now?”

Go ahead and write up that idea now. What experiments would you like your great grandkids to do on that starship? Let’s plan ahead to make that interstellar journey an exciting trip for our exoplanetary descendants!

Tunnels Between the Stars

In an issue of Green Lantern Corps, entitled "Recharge" from way back in 2006, a nemesis called "The Spider Guild" sneaked to the home planet of the Green Lantern Corps by passing through a wormhole connecting the stars. These tunnels between the stars are called "The Subspace Web". By entering another star (or blackhole) from a different sector of the universe, the 'spiders' traversed through subspace web and then emerged directly from within Oa's sun and attacked the Green Lantern's base "from out of the light".



It's all Science Fiction, so far. Right?

Now for the Science part.

A recent study suggests that wormholes might exist between distant stars. However, it's not easy to detect if a star could harbor some passageway hidden deep within its center. But the scientists are saying that they could be distinguishable from normal stars (or even from normal neutron stars). And it's because these wormholes are not empty tunnels, rather they contain a perfect fluid that flows back and forth between the two stars, giving them a detectable signature via their pulsations.

Wait. It's still Science Fiction!

Nope. Actually, real scientists and astrophysicists are saying this. See for yourself on their ArXiv paper. And take note: Kepler has detected a lot of pulsating stars in their Asteroseismological studies. Yes, Kepler also deals with Asteroseismology--the science that involves probing the interiors of stars and quantifying their global properties, such as radius and age, through observations of normal modes of oscillation. So, ya never know! Our good ol' Kepler might discover some wormhole-bearing stars! Heh!



Now back to the fiction. To cut a long story short, by sheer teamwork, inspired by a massive recital of their green lantern oath (in brightest day, in blackest night...blah...blah), the Green Lantern Corps managed to push back the invading marauders back into the star--including the star itself! Their own sun got pushed into the wormhole-tunnel from the outside-in and was destroyed along with the Spider Guild's nest. So now, in that episode, the green lantern's planet Oa has actually become a starless planet, a rogue planet!

And there you have it, folks. Just a brief excursion in the world of scifi on a friday night! Happy Friday!

Links:
A Star Harbouring a Wormhole at its Center (PDF)
Stars Could Have Wormholes At Their Cores (Tech. Review)
the possibility of wormholes between stars (Physorg)

Exoplanets are not Planets

How long will exoplanets keep on destroying our predefined notions? Just a few days short of smashing our theories of planetary formation into smithereens, now we have two exoplanets sharing one orbit.

According to the International Astronomical Union (IAU) a planet should clear its orbit of other objects. This condition was a source of heated debate among astronomers that rages on to this very day. It was this alienating third criterion that dethroned Pluto and other dwarf planets from planetary status.

So when I heard that KOI-730's exoplanets were sharing orbits, my first reaction was, “Hey wait a minute...if we try to apply the ‘official’ definition of 'planet' to these exoplanets, they would not be planets at all!”

This is just one instance, but i'm sure there are many derivatives of the case of KOI-730's co-orbiting exoplanets that "share" orbits with other objects. Think of intersecting resonant orbital paths, or locked LaGrangian exoplanet orbits, or exoplanets still in the process of clearing out debris in their path. (It would take millions of years for young planets to clear their orbital zones, mind you.)

I’ve always thought that exoplanets are planets. But today, I'm rethinking that. Yes, exoplanets continue to surprise us, and it's for that reason that I once concluded, Exoplanet is the new 'Planet' by virtue of the awe and wonder that they instill upon us. But now, I’ve come to another realization: Exoplanets are not Planets, and that is liberating. It frees the mind from a limited way of thinking, because the mindset needed for understanding exoplanets is different. Exoplanet discoveries forces you to unlearn, and it frees your mind from the confines of your own star system. Exoplanets require a novel way of thinking. And that is why I love exoplanets so much. They make us think in new ways. Exoplanets make us think outside the sphere! And all that is possible because of Science.

It frustrates me when some astronomers deny dwarf planets of being planets, and yet speak of exoplanets as planets in a carefree way. I want to avoid being annoyed by such inconsistent mindset. So I am letting go of the debate about planets. (Of course, I still consider dwarf planets as legit planets) I will simply let planets be planets, and exoplanets be exoplanets. Just that. I will not try to make exoplanets fit in as planets. I will not even attempt to redefine what a planet is, or grumble about its flawed definition. In fact, I'd rather we keep the current planet definition the way it is now. Let it be a reminder, a tainted bygone--an old ugly chapter in the history of Astronomy.

Perhaps someday, a new definition of the planet will emerge, one that is more universal, that will encompass exoplanets as well. But for now, we are experiencing a temporary chaos brought about by the "growing pains" in our effort to understand the universe.

But until then, with the narrow-minded planet definition we have arrogantly locked ourselves into, who can say with certainty that exoplanets are planets?

This is a new era of planetary thinking. Humanity’s concept of the Planet is of the past, but Exoplanets are of the future.

Links:
NewScientist: Two exoplanets found, sharing one orbit
Life, Unbounded: Make Me a Planet
Theories of Planetary Formation, Busted
Exoplanet is the new 'Planet'

Sunless Biospheres

Today, I heard about the newly discovered sets of undersea vents found near Antartica. I can’t help but remember an article just a few days ago that mentioned the possibility of rogue planets harboring life. Although the theory is based on computer simulations, the researchers say that a “Steppenwolf planet” wandering in outer space like a “lone wolf”--may have liquid oceans if the water were heated from below by the planet's core and insulated from above by a thick layer of ice. A sunless biosphere.

I wonder how long these Steppenwolf planets will manage to keep the heat inside it's shell of ice to give enough time for life to synthesize from within its undersea vents. Time and luck is definitely a factor. Nevertheless, there’s a lot of planets out there; and not even counting exomoons in the equation, Hydrothermal Vents may be common for those planets that may have ample amount of water and enough internal heat as a source of energy. And judging from the resiliency of life as demonstrated by extremophiles thriving upon the energy and minerals around these vents, it makes me even more convinced of the possibility that life may be common in the universe.

Perhaps Life is not wholly dependent upon stars and suns. Perhaps Life just needs is a source of energy in any which form it is available and it will take hold given enough time and space--which in this case, is a Sunless Biosphere of a Steppenwolf Planet.

Links:
More deep-sea vents discovered
Rogue Planets could harbor life

Transit Light-Curve Signatures of Artificial Objects

Hot on the trail of Transit Light Curve (TLC*) Mechanics, I’d like to follow up my previous post dealing with transits by featuring this topic: Transit Light-Curve Signatures of Artificial Objects. It's a "Dysonian SETI" paper written by Luc Arnold from way back in 2005 that also mentions possible signals that might be encoded within transit light curves, and hints at the detection of ringed planets as well.

The main idea is that non-spherical objects have different light curve signatures and should be distinguishable from the usual patterns of a transiting planet.

Because hundreds or thousands of people are now looking at light curves via the Planet Hunters project, I thought it’s a good idea to post what the paper says about unusual light-curve patterns that might be caused by the transit of artificial planet-sized objects. Who knows? Perhaps the common folk hunting for planets might end up finding Civilizations as well!

So, dear planet-hunter slash civilization-hunter, start familiarizing yourself with the sample patterns I compiled below (as a quick reference) while you're classifiying light curves at PlanetHunters.org. Good luck with spotting that Kardashev Type II Civilization !!!

* TLC Mechanics/Dynamics, A sub-field of the science of planet-hunting focused on the study and analysis of Transit Light Curves