000 01968 a2200181 4500
020 _a9781802064919
082 _a576.839
_bK127a
100 _aKaltenegger, Lisa
245 _aAlien earths
_bthe search for life in the cosmos
_cLisa Kaltenegger
260 _bPenguin
_c2025
_aNew Delhi
300 _a275p
500 _a'Horizon-expanding' The Times
520 _aFor thousands of years, humans have wondered whether we're alone in the cosmos. Now, for the first time, we have the technology to investigate. The question should have an obvious answer: yes or no. But once you try to find life elsewhere, you realize it is not so simple. How do you find it over cosmic distances? What actually is life? As founding director of Cornell University's Carl Sagan Institute, astrophysicist Lisa Kaltenegger built a team of tenacious scientists from many disciplines to create a uniquely specialized toolkit to find life on faraway worlds. In Alien Earths, she demonstrates how we can use our homeworld as a Rosetta Stone, creatively analyzing Earth's history and its astonishing biosphere to inform this search. With infectious enthusiasm, she takes us on an eye-opening journey to the most unusual exoplanets that have shaken our worldview - planets covered in oceans of lava, lonely wanderers lost in space, and others with more than one sun in their sky! And the best contenders for Alien Earths. We also see the imagined worlds of science fiction and how close they come to reality. We live in an incredible new epoch of exploration. As our witty and knowledgeable tour guide, Professor Kaltenegger shows how we discover not merely new continents, like the explorers of old, but whole new worlds circling other stars and how we could spot life there. Worlds from where aliens may even be gazing back at us. What if we're not alone?
650 _aLife on other planets
650 _aExtrasolar planets -- Exploration
650 _aAstrobiology
942 _cBK
999 _c567578
_d567578