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Earth is 1st stop as probe looks for other worlds

Cowen says that variable brightness — particularly in the wavelengths where light reflected off water and land show up most vividly — might be an important clue that an alien planet shares Earth's proclivity for water, and perhaps life.

"The spectral resolution and coverage we used will be close to optimal for Earth-like planets," Drake Deming, the spacecraft's deputy principal scientist, wrote in an e-mail to Discovery News.

Follow-up investigations to assess the chemical makeup of a target planet's atmosphere and its surface composition would be needed before any definitive claim could be made that an alien planet has oceans.

"There's going to be a lot of skeptics if you go and claim you found water on an extrasolar planet," Cowan said.

Scientists plan to use Deep Impact to get some polar views of Earth before the spacecraft heads out for its comet rendezvous.

"We imaged the Earth from above the north pole in March, and we are looking forward to a south pole view in September," said Deming.

Cowan's results will be published in the August issue of the Astrophysical Journal.

2 Jun 2009 - 15:51 by soullezz

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