Film & Animation

How to Find an Inhabited Exoplanet

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Over the past couple decades, research has uncovered thousands of exoplanets in orbit around other stars. In particular, the NASA Kepler Mission taught us that Earth-sized planets are commonplace throughout the Galaxy. But the big question remains – did life take root on any of these distant worlds? Using upcoming large telescopes, astronomers will examine the atmospheres of Earth-like planets for the telltale chemical fingerprints of life. The search for life in the universe has entered an exciting new phase. ... Read More

Dark Energy and New Worlds: NASA’s WFIRST Mission

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Our everyday experience with gravity is that of an attractive force: it pulls things closer. But we’ve discovered a very peculiar property about our expanding universe: the expansion is accelerating, as if some repulsive force is pushing it apart. Why and how does this unknown ‘dark energy’ push the cosmos? This strange, fundamental question is one that NASA’s WFIRST telescope is designed to address. That same technology will also allow us to learn more about exoplanets in new ways, and will provide us with images that are ~100x larger in area than Hubble and Webb. The WFIRST mission will set the stage to usher in a new era of understanding about our universe.... Read More