After more than 30 years of studying the Earth, a team at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York will adapt its global climate model to simulate conditions on potentially habitable exoplanets.
The effort is part of a broader push to identify Earth-like worlds.
“We have to start thinking about these things as more than planetary objects. All of a sudden, this has become a topic not just for astronomers, but for planetary scientists and now climate scientists,” said Anthony Del Genio, climate modeller, who is leading the GISS effort.
NASA’s space-based Kepler telescope has found more than 1,000 alien planets.
At least five of these planets are similar in size to the Earth and located in the “habitable zone” where liquid water could persist.
The next step would be to detect light passing through exoplanet atmospheres, which could hold clues to conditions on these distant worlds, Nature reported.
Del Genio’s group is one of nearly 16 — ranging from the Earth and planetary scientists to solar physicists and astrophysicists — that are participating in NASA’s new Nexus for Exoplanet System Science (NExSS) programme.
“We are bringing together a bunch of different disciplines and they all look at the formation and functioning of planets in different ways,” added Mary Voytek, who organised NExSS.