If Earth were an exoplanet, JWST would detect an intelligent civilization. A recent study published on preprint server arXiv revealed that if Earth were an exoplanet, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) would be able to detect molecules in their atmospheres. shows the presence of life. The study uses actual observations of Earth’s atmosphere taken by the Canadian satellite SCISAT, identifying a wide range of natural and synthetic molecules. The researchers simulated the possible spectrum of Earth as it passed by the sun, as seen from the outer solar system. This provides the basis for data that can be obtained from an exoplanet. The team then added simulated noise and sampled the data at a lower resolution, similar to the observations JWST would make of distant exoplanets. The results show that even with faint and noisy observations, JWST can still identify atmospheric patterns and detect molecules on an Earth-like exoplanet within 50 light-years from Earth. land. The researchers went further by looking at the Trappist-1 exoplanet system, which is located 40 light-years away and has seven known planets, two or three of which are potentially habitable. By injecting molecular spectroscopy into the simulated spectra of the Trappist world, the team demonstrated that JWST can identify biological and technological markers on these exoplanets. Although JWST cannot identify extraterrestrial structures, detecting oxygen, organic molecules, and synthetic molecules such as CFCs in the atmosphere of a nearby exoplanet would indicate the presence of a background. intelligent civilization. This would be a significant advance in our understanding of life in the universe. Source: – Jacob Lustig-Yaeger et al., Earth is a transitional exoplanet: Validation of transmission spectroscopy and atmospheric recovery methods for terrestrial exoplanets, arXiv (2023). –
