Proxima Centauri Shoots Out Humongous Flare, with Big Implications for Alien Life (space.com) 56
"Scientists have spotted one of the largest stellar flares ever recorded in our galaxy," reports Space.com:
The jets of plasma shot outward from the sun's nearest neighbor, the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri. The flare, which was around 100 times more powerful than any experienced in our solar system, could change the way scientists think about solar radiation and alien life...
On May 1, 2019, the team captured the mega flare, which shone for just 7 seconds and was mainly visible in the ultraviolet spectrum. "The star went from normal to 14,000 times brighter when seen in ultraviolet wavelengths over the span of a few seconds," lead author Meredith MacGregor, an astrophysicist at the University of Colorado Boulder, said in a statement...
The flare on Proxima Centauri was extremely powerful compared with those emitted by the sun. Unlike flares from the sun, this one also emitted different kinds of radiation. In particular, it produced a huge surge of ultraviolet light and radio waves — known as "millimeter radiation...." The new findings suggest that stellar flares given off by red dwarfs are much more violent than previously expected and could reduce the likelihood of alien life developing around them.
Proxima Centauri is orbited by two explanets, one of which "is considered to be Earth-like and lies within the star's habitable zone — the distance from a star that could support the development of life, according to the researchers..."
But in a statement, the leader authors now points out that Proxima Centauri's planets "are getting hit by something like this not once in a century, but at least once a day, if not several times a day."
On May 1, 2019, the team captured the mega flare, which shone for just 7 seconds and was mainly visible in the ultraviolet spectrum. "The star went from normal to 14,000 times brighter when seen in ultraviolet wavelengths over the span of a few seconds," lead author Meredith MacGregor, an astrophysicist at the University of Colorado Boulder, said in a statement...
The flare on Proxima Centauri was extremely powerful compared with those emitted by the sun. Unlike flares from the sun, this one also emitted different kinds of radiation. In particular, it produced a huge surge of ultraviolet light and radio waves — known as "millimeter radiation...." The new findings suggest that stellar flares given off by red dwarfs are much more violent than previously expected and could reduce the likelihood of alien life developing around them.
Proxima Centauri is orbited by two explanets, one of which "is considered to be Earth-like and lies within the star's habitable zone — the distance from a star that could support the development of life, according to the researchers..."
But in a statement, the leader authors now points out that Proxima Centauri's planets "are getting hit by something like this not once in a century, but at least once a day, if not several times a day."
One in a billion. (Score:5, Insightful)
So in plain English exoplanets aren't enough. Conditions have to be right elsewhere. That includes things like comets and meteors (hello Jupiter [matrixdisclosure.com]).
Odds very Unclear (Score:2)
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So in plain English exoplanets aren't enough. Conditions have to be right elsewhere.
Not really. It only means life that is familiar to us would not survive there. Any life that evolved on such a planet would be perfectly adapted to these outbursts, e.g. by staying on the night side, burrowing underground, using radiation resistant materials for body parts etc.
They might find our conditions just as unlivable to them as we do theirs. A 24-hour day/night cycle would cause certain death to a plant that expects perpetual twilight.
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I think it deserves to be modded up, but simpler solution might be to stay in the deeper water rather than burrowing. Still an anthropomorphic argument.
The first line of the story summary is still ridiculous. What are the odds that the largest anything in our galaxy just happens to be next door? Even Fluke (by Joseph Mazur) wouldn't buy that one.
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Wait, you thought all the exoplanets were around Proxima Centauri?!?!? What?
The implication is that exoplanets orbiting red dwarf stars might be much less likely to harbor life.
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life is better when you think in concepts and systems since thinking in words is a waste of brainspace
seems like a lot of extra energy to me overthere
So the Galaxy is ours to explore!!! (Score:5, Funny)
Assuming we don’t off ourselves, future generations will have less worries about dealing with aliens. Less chance of running into Cardassians and more chance of us infection other planets with Kardashians.
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So much for the blue monkeys.
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Yes, but we've met the Thermians, right? I saw it happen in a historical document.
Re: So the Galaxy is ours to explore!!! (Score:2)
We canâ(TM)t get there unless we have robots doing most of our manual work, but people are afraid of robots.
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There's great odds that being afraid enough of robots is immensely selective, evolutionarily speaking.
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The Kardashians already have a constellation named after their infamous anatomy. [wikipedia.org] Although, this is probably more fitting. [wikipedia.org]
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Shake your boh-ooties (which is how it is pronounced)!
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which is how it is pronounced
No. It really isn't.
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Guessing people on other planets are hoping for the reverse.
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Assuming the solar flares don't melt off their enormous posteriors.
Life is extremely adaptive (Score:5, Interesting)
"...100 times more powerful than any experienced in our solar system..."
So just because higher forms of life in our system would likely not survive such an event, it is not proof that life could not develop and continue to evolve in the Centauri system.
Life is a paradox. Extremely fragile, yet extremely robust.
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Altering our definition of, "what is life". Let alone "higher".
Re: Life is extremely adaptive (Score:5, Interesting)
Plus, life underground or in the deep ocean may actually benefit from these types of events. Itâ(TM)s free energy and maybe food if creatures higher above fall.
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"...100 times more powerful than any experienced in our solar system..."
So just because higher forms of life in our system would likely not survive such an event, it is not proof that life could not develop and continue to evolve in the Centauri system.
Life is a paradox. Extremely fragile, yet extremely robust.
Being robust against things like monstrous X-ray flashes might be possible for organic life. But getting there is half the fun, as well as a necessary precursor. If life is to originate in such an e
Re:Life is extremely adaptive (Score:5, Interesting)
Being robust against things like monstrous X-ray flashes might be possible for organic life. But getting there is half the fun, as well as a necessary precursor.
Lets speak of precursors. Water. I haven't heard one way or another on whether or not this planet has any indications of the presence of water, but let's assume for argument that it has oceans. X-rays get attenuated quite a bit by water. Any region of deep water would provide substantial protection from radiation's effects on DNA_EQUIVALENT.
Life as we know it requires the big 3: water, carbon, energy. With all these flares going on, there will be plenty of energy available in high in a water column where the X-rays work their magic on chemistry, creating high energy compounds potentially usable by life that can hide in the deeper water feeding off those compounds.
Re:Life has lots of time with a red dwarf (Score:1)
Life having to adapt to those conditions for the entire life time of their star would find the surface of any ocean to be more inhospitable to it than outer space is to us.
Red dwarfs have very long life times compared to the Sun. Although life appeared on earth maybe 3 billion years ago. It was unicellular microbes until 610 million years ago. The sun is currently increasing in brightness by 1% every 100 million years.
Our sun might have a life span of 10 billion years, A red dwarf might have a life span of 10 trillion years. So, life would have a lot more time to meet the challenges of an environment created by a red dwarf.
Now that I think about it, I'm wondering how le
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Replying to my own post after thinking about it some more. If life evolved on Proxima Centauri to handle Proxima's solar flares, that might enable it to handle an Alpha Centauri Supernova.
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Intense flaring like this - the flare strength for a planet close enough for life is 70,000 more intense than the largest solar flare ever seen - will strip away the atmosphere over time.
I, For One, Welcome ... (Score:3)
Our sun (Score:5, Informative)
The cautionary tale is its only detrimental to our current above ground biosphere and what we perceive life to be, not even to earth life in general. This is because massive amounts of subsurface life [sciencedaily.com] exist on earth and may have even evolved deep below the surface. You could have planets outside of the “Goldilocks” zone of a stars radiation, but due to radioactive decay, or tidal heating, a “Goldilocks” zone could exist internally. Similarly, solar flares would destroy atmospheres and bombard the surface and surface adjacent areas with inhospitable radiation, but internal rock is almost completely unaffected. Life deep in rock also adds to the case of trans planet transfer of life as if it’s everywhere through a planets rock then it’s not so implausible some would be carried away by impacts and survive. Tl;dr Cool info but it’s too early to rule out where earth style life could exist.
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> itâ(TM)s too early to rule out where earth style life could exist.
This depends. If you're looking for microscopic, single-celled life, yes. By current knowledge, that could be anywhere there's liquid water, a few common elements, and a reasonable energy gradient.
If you want tool users with human-like intelligence or even technology, you're going to need a very similar environment. Somewhere wet for life to start, somewhere dry for it to spread and discover fire.
That almost certainly means surfa
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Re:Our sun (Score:4, Interesting)
>red dwarf stars are far far more common than any other class of star, and itâ(TM)s not clear that literally all of them have excessive flares compared to our sun
As far as I'm aware, lower mass stars are more volatile while larger mass stars have shorter lifetimes.
You can go a bit smaller than the Sun before volatility becomes an issue (or the Goldlocks zone being within tidal locking distance), and while I haven't looked into it you can presumably get a bit bigger than the Sun before the main sequence period is inconveniently brief.
While I'm not an astronomer or an exobiology theorist or anything like that, planets orbiting a red dwarf are really, really far down the list of places I'd look for life despite their relative numbers.
And then there is the matter of the Streetlight Effect - because a light year is a ridiculously long distance, to detect life anywhere outside the Solar system it's going to have to be life that's created a chemical signature in the planet's atmosphere we can detect with spectroscopic analysis. Large scale life on the surface of an atmosphere-bearing world seems like the only place you even could find that.
Re:Our sun (Score:4, Interesting)
As far as I'm aware, lower mass stars are more volatile while larger mass stars have shorter lifetimes.
The lifetime of a star is pretty closely tied to the inverse square of its mass. Say our sun is a 10B/yr sun and life needs 4B/yr to be similar to earth, then a napkin calculation says our sun could last only 40% as long or be about 1.6x more massive. As for “volatile” that is not correct. It’s a complicated mix of, among other details, spin rate, size, metalicity and the distance from the star to the habital zone. This paper [iop.org] discusses why leading scientists consider m dwarf stars among the most likely suspects for life as we know it despite some, like Proxima Centauri, being flare (variable) stars.
And then there is the matter of the Streetlight Effect - because a light year is a ridiculously long distance, to detect life anywhere outside the Solar system it's going to have to be life that's created a chemical signature in the planet's atmosphere we can detect with spectroscopic analysis. Large scale life on the surface of an atmosphere-bearing world seems like the only place you even could find that.
You would only need simple cellular life, and not even necessarily on the surface, on earth it likely happened under water. Pretty much any planet wouldn’t naturally have an oxygen atmosphere, it’s extremely reactive. Earth went through an early phase where simple cellular life completely changed the atmosphere. Although red dwarf stars can be harder to see at a given distance, that isn’t a problem for the closer ones and our telescopes are getting better every year.
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The problem of Proxima Centauri is it's class. As a red dwarf star the planets must be MUCH closer to the star where these flares and x-ray emissions are much much higher.
A lot of astronomers don't think life is likely around red dwarfs because of the fact that to have liquid water the planet needs to be as close as mercury. And that close you are heavily exposed to x-ray emissions and solar flares. Thing that would prevent the development of type of life we know.
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Dunno about you (Score:4, Funny)
I for one, welcome our super-tanned overlords.
Although tint probably fake (Score:5, Funny)
Oh please, still getting over the last one.
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"Oh please, still getting over the last one."
Didn't think about that one at all. :-)
What about this one? (Score:2)
Here is a photo of an orange overlord's understudy
https://babylonbee.com/news/ro... [babylonbee.com]
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and in seemingly unrelated news . . . (Score:2)
surely not related, but UFO sightings are down 40% in the last year and a half . . .
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They flared up just recently.
That last sentence undoes the entire news event. (Score:4, Interesting)
Proxima Centauri's planets "are getting hit by something like this not once in a century, but at least once a day, if not several times a day."
So then why is this news, if it's happening every day?
Re: That last sentence undoes the entire news even (Score:2)
I was looking for this comment.
What the hell. That sentence contradicts the entire rest of the summary!
Why is everyone else just running with it like they never read that? WTF?
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Re: That last sentence undoes the entire news even (Score:2)
In other words (Score:2)
The Red Dwarf universe may have been the most accurate of any sci-fi television show.
It wouldn't surprise me - I've run into many more Arnold Rimmers than Jean-Luc Picards...
Like an ex-parrot (Score:2)
Proxima Centauri is orbited by two explanets
Like Pluto, eh?
And no, they aren't exoplanets. Stop using that word. Everyone is familiar with planets in different solar systems thanks to growing up with science fiction everywhere. And those few too stupid to know this probably think the sun or Earth is the center of the universe, so "it's a planet in another solar system" has no meaning to them.
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