The idea of extraterrestrial life described by an expert in astronomy 3:46
Atacama Desert, Chile (Reuters) -
In
Chile's
arid Atacama Desert, astronomers are scanning the clear night skies for life on other planets and studying so-called "dark energy," a mysterious cosmic force that it is believed to drive the accelerating expansion of the universe.
In the race to peer into distant worlds, the Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT) is essential, a complex of US $ 1.8 billion that is being built in the Las Campanas observatory and that will have a resolution 10 times higher. to that of the Hubble Space Telescope.
This space telescope will explore the secrets of the Universe 0:47
The telescope, which is expected to come online at the end of the decade, will compete with the European Southern Observatory's Extremely Large Telescope, located further north in the same desert, as well as the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) that is being built. in Hawaii.
"This new generation of giant telescopes is aimed precisely at detecting life on other planets and determining the origin of dark energy," said Leopoldo Infante, director of the Las Campanas observatory.
"It is a race of these three groups to see who comes first and who makes the first discovery."
Infante said the new giant telescope could detect organic molecules in the atmosphere of distant planets.
"That is the expectation," he said.
"And whoever detects life on another planet will win the Nobel Prize, I assure you."
The other prize is the study of dark energy, which is not the same as the equally enigmatic dark matter, which is considered a property of space and which drives the accelerating expansion of the universe.
It makes up a large part of the universe, but remains for the most part an unsolved mystery.
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"There is an energy that makes the universe expand, but also accelerates that expansion," Infante said, adding that scientists knew that this energy must exist, although they did not understand its origin.
"So this telescope is designed to be able to study precisely what is called dark energy in the universe, to be able to physically understand what it is and where it comes from."
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