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LIFE paper VIII accepted: “Where is the phosphine?”
November 16, 2022
Phosphine is a key molecule in the understanding of exotic chemistry of exoplanet atmospheres. While it has been detected in the Solar System's giant planets, it has not been observed in exoplanets yet. In the exoplanetary context however it has been theorized as a potential biosignature molecule. Angerhausen et al. identified a representative set of scenarios for phosphine detections in exoplanetary atmospheres varying over the whole dynamic range of the LIFE mission.
Paper VII of the LIFE paper series accepted for publication
November 1, 2022
In this paper, Hansen et al (arxiv) follows on their analysis of architectures from paper IV, this time delving into some of the practical and instrumental considerations of building a beam combiner. They present a possible five telescope…
Paper VI of the LIFE paper series accepted for publication
October 7, 2022
Kammerer et al. (arXiv link) show that LIFE would also be a powerful mission to search for Earth-like planets around Sun-like stars. This is important because the true habitability of habitable zone (HZ) planets around M-dwarfs is still an…
LIFE in the media
A telescope fleet designed to study nearby worlds
[Astronomy] LIFE would use multiple satellites flying in formation to separate the faint thermal glow of rocky planets from the overwhelming light of their host stars.