A team of scientists from Cambridge is studying the atmosphere of the planet K2-18b (that’s how it’s named). He has found signs here of molecules that are found on Earth and are produced only by ordinary microorganisms.
This is the second time chemicals linked to life have been found in a planet’s atmosphere. This time it is a study about the possibility of life on a planet. These signals were detected by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope.
But the team and independent astronomers stress that more data will be needed to confirm these results.
Prof Madhusudan hoped that evidence will be available soon to arrive at a final conclusion. “This is by far the most convincing evidence that life exists there. If I say realistically, we can confirm this sign of life within a year or two.” K 2-18 b is two and a half times the size of Earth. And from here it is 700 trillion miles away.
The James Webb Space Telescope is so powerful that it can analyze the planet’s chemical composition using light from a small red sun. The planet orbits around it.
In their study, the Cambridge scientists found that one of the two molecules in this environment has chemical signatures that are associated with life. These are dimethyl sulfide and dimethyl disulfide. On Earth, these two gases are produced by marine phytoplankton and bacteria.
Professor Madhusudan said that how much gas has been detected by the first observation. He said he was shocked to see this. “The amount of this gas that we have found is a thousand times more than what exists on Earth,” he said. So the signs of life here seem real. Life can exist on this planet. ”
“If we can confirm life in K2-18b, we can broadly confirm that life is common in the Milky Way,” said Professor Madhusudan.”
However, Prof Madhusudan’s team openly says that there are many ‘buts and buts’ involved at the moment.
The first is that the recent indications have not reached the standard where they can be recognised as a scientific discovery.
For this, the researchers have to be 99.99999 per cent sure that their results are correct and that it is not just a random study.
In the language of scientists, the results of scientific discoveries are up to ‘Five Sigma’. Signals from the new planet go up to three sigma in terms of results. The accuracy is 99.7 per cent. In terms of results, this is very promising.
At the moment, these are not convincing results for the scientific community. However, this is more than the One Sigma result obtained by a team 18 months ago, which is 68 percent in terms of accuracy. At the time, the results were highly questionable.
Prof Katharine Hemmens, professor at the University of Edinburgh and Scotland’s Astronomer Royal, said that although the Cambridge team had achieved the five-sigma result, it could not be said in the end that there is life on that planet.
Hemmens was not part of the research team. “Even though there are strong signs of life on this planet, the question still remains as to where this gas is coming from,” he told Us. ”
“This gas is produced by microorganisms in the ocean on Earth. But without solid data, we can’t say for sure that this generation of gases on an alien planet is biological. There are thousands of strange things in the universe. We don’t know what biological activities can occur on this planet, which can produce molecules. ”
The Cambridge team agrees with this view. Scientists are divided into several groups and are studying whether demethyl sulfide and demethyl disulfide can be made from inanimate mediums in the lab.
Other research groups have suggested alternatives based on data from K2-18b. But it’s not organic. The existence and composition of demethyl sulfide and demethyl disulfide are hotly debated among scientists.
This is because many researchers have concluded that there is an ocean in this planet. And there is no ammonia. Because ammonia is absorbed by the sea or similar water area.
But Prof Oliver Shortall, from the University of Cambridge, said the situation could only be described as a sea of molten rock.
“Everything we know about planets orbiting other stars comes from the tiny fraction of light that hits their atmospheres,” he said. But these are incredibly weak signals that we need to watch out for. ”
“K2-18b is still part of the scientific debate about how this planet is structured. ”
Dr. Nicolar Vogen of NASA’s Ames Research Center says they have another explanation for this data. The research they have published suggests that K2-18b is a mini gas giant that has no surface.
Both of these alternative explanations have been challenged by several scientific groups. They argue that these interpretations do not match the data from the James Webb Space Telescope.
Professor Madhusudan believes that if he has to answer one of the biggest questions in science (the question of whether there is life other than on Earth), he will have to climb many mountains of science. But he believes he and his team are on the right track.
“Decades from now, we can look back at this point in time and say that this was the time when life beyond Earth was within our reach,” he said. Whether there is anyone besides us in the universe, perhaps we will be able to answer this question. “
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