back to article PACK YOUR BAGS! Two Trappist-1 planets have watery oceans, most likely to be inhabitable

A team of scientists have identified two out of the seven planets in the Trappist-1 system as the most likely to be habitable, according to a new study. Since its discovery, announced earlier last year, the Trappist-1 system has been of great interest to astronomers – and anyone else sick of Earth, to be honest. A previous …

  1. Adrian 4
    Pint

    But do they have Trappist beer ?

    1. Spudley

      But do they have Trappist beer ?

      Oceans of the stuff. Oceans, I tell ya.

      (Allegedly)

    2. Marco van de Voort

      And if so, how did they get the monks there?

      1. m0rt

        Monk parents?

        1. Tom 7

          Monk Parents?

          Advanced enough for IV then. ISTR Trappist beer was responsible for many contraceptive effects.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        "how did they get the monks there?"

        ... the Monk's have always been there (and have guided life there through its development)

      3. Simon Harris
        Alien

        "And if so, how did they get the monks there?"

        If only they'd used Vincent Ward's original script for Alien 3 we might have found out.

  2. Forget It
    Pint

    > But do they have Trappist beer ?

    If they do

    they are keeping quite about it.

    1. Anonymous Coward
  3. Flywheel

    Food chain

    "most likely to be inhabitable"

    So they almost certainly are already! And then humans arrive, and before we know it, we're a tasty snack for something extremely large, water-dwelling and hungry. Let's send our space-cowboy billionaires up there first to do a recce!

    1. Chris G

      Re: Food chain

      More likely anything large and interesting will be hunted to extinction, if it is sentient, then they will govern it to extinction.

      1. VinceH
        Alien

        Re: Food chain

        "More likely anything large and interesting will be hunted to extinction, if it is sentient, then they will govern it to extinction."

        Quite. If we were a race capable of interstellar travel (in useful time frames), the only chance life on other worlds would probably have is if it was much more advanced than us.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Food chain

      "most likely to be inhabitable"

      You've introduced an error there - the original quote "most likely to be habitable" was correct. But then Ms. KQ later makes the same mistake "it was believed that none of them were inhabitable at all..." Doh!

      1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        Re: Food chain

        @LeeE

        "most likely to be inhabitable...Doh!"

        Doh indeed. Inhabitable is a perfectly good word meaning the same as habitable. You seem to think it isn't.

        1. Roj Blake Silver badge

          Re: Food chain

          "Inflammable means flammable?"

          - Dr Nick Riviera

      2. Dr. Ellen

        Re: Food chain

        Habitable, inhabitable -- same confusion as flammable, inflammable. English is a crazy language, but it sure has a lot of words. It can afford redundancy.

        1. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

          Re: Food chain

          English is a crazy language, but it sure has a lot of words

          That's what happens when you chase other languages into a dark alley and mug them for their vocabulary..

          (Also, ruling 1/3 of the earth..)

    3. mistersilver134

      Re: Food chain

      No send politicians British and US.

  4. frank ly

    "... and retain a good level of heat to avoid runaway greenhouse effects that would boil away any water."

    Should that say, "... but avoid runaway ..."?

    Does this mean they've modelled different possible atmospheres as well?

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Comment about the artwork...

    One thing I never get: why does the artwork which is shown in these articles always show a scenery which is pretty much unlikely?

    Take this one, you see a rather big planet right up the sky. Even though the star they orbit is comparable to our sun in size and the distance idemditto. So there's no way you'd get to see the sun as shown in the image shown in the article, yet here we are.

    Now, I know that those images make for much more spectacular stuff and it may even do a much better job at triggering one's imagination. But still... why can't it never be an imagine which pictures a more probable (realistic) scenery?

    1. Jedit Silver badge

      "why does the artwork always show a scenery which is pretty much unlikely?"

      Because if people want to see a realistic looking alien world, they'll go to Anglesey.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: "why does the artwork always show a scenery which is pretty much unlikely?"

        Or they could try Sheerness...

        El reg is full of journalists with clip art libraries, not artists though - if you want that you will have to be referred to New Scientist magazine or similar (as long as you want interesting stuff that's not really IT related...)

        1. ravenviz Silver badge
          Trollface

          Re: "why does the artwork always show a scenery which is pretty much unlikely?"

          Blaenau Ffestiniog.

          "dywedodd digon"

      2. John Sturdy

        Re: "why does the artwork always show a scenery which is pretty much unlikely?"

        Or a quarry in Devon, like where Blake's Seven found themselves repeatedly.

        1. ravenviz Silver badge

          Re: "why does the artwork always show a scenery which is pretty much unlikely?"

          They must of met Doctor Who there at some point

          1. PhilBuk

            Re: "why does the artwork always show a scenery which is pretty much unlikely?"

            "of met"

            Huh??

            Phil.

            1. SealTeam6

              Re: "why does the artwork always show a scenery which is pretty much unlikely?"

              Yes, we get illiterate people on this site too...

          2. Roj Blake Silver badge

            Re: "why does the artwork always show a scenery which is pretty much unlikely?"

            I did hear a story once (on a Radio 4 documentary) that on one occasion they were filming Blake's 7 when they kept being interrupted by someone blowing stuff up over the other side of the quarry. They sent someone over to complain as they had been assured that no quarrying would be happening that day, and it turns out that Dr Who was to blame.

    2. cray74

      Re: Comment about the artwork...

      Take this one, you see a rather big planet right up the sky. Even though the star they orbit is comparable to our sun in size and the distance idemditto. So there's no way you'd get to see the sun as shown in the image shown in the article, yet here we are.

      The planets depicted in the art fall between the foreground planet and Trappist-1. The supposedly habitable-ish planets identified by this study are Trappist-1d and -1e. Therefore, the extreme scenario for the artwork would be an observer on the surface of -1e looking at potentially Trappist-1 and the planets -1b, -1c, and/or -1d.

      **Trappist-1, a tiny M8V dwarf, is 0.121 times the diameter of the sun.

      **Trappist-1b is 0.011AU from the star and 1.13x Earth's diameter (with rounding on both values)

      **Trappist-1c is 0.015AU from the star and 1.1x Earth's diameter

      **Trappist-1d is 0.021AU from the star and 0.788x Earth's diameter

      **Trappist-1e is 0.028AU from the star, diameter irrelevant since I'm positing the observer is on the surface

      For someone on -1e, the star Trappist-1 is 0.121 times Sol's absolute diameter but 35.7 times closer in the sky. Approximately speaking, Trappist-1 will appear (0.121 x 35.7) = 4.3 times larger in diameter than Sol and cover 18.7x more area. It will be a big globe in the sky, quite a bit larger than Sol or Luna. On the horizon, as depicted in the article's artwork, it could appear that big due to the moon illusion. Since the surface temperature is 2500K, it will be fairly easy to stare at, too, a modest "warm, soft white" color that invites lots of naked eye observation while the excess infrared light burns your retinas.

      Meanwhile, the planets -1b, -1c, and -1d could appear sizable, too.

      1b: Since the world is between the star and foreground planet, which I'm assuming is 1e, the distance is about 0.028 - 0.011 = 0.017AU. This is about 2.55 million kilometers, or 8 times the Earth-moon separation. 1b is, however, 1.13x Earth's diameter and 4.14x Luna's diameter. In this scenario, 1b could appear up to 4.14 / 8 = 0.51 times Luna's diameter in the sky - a distinct globe, but smaller than Luna. One notes the transiting planet is quite small compared to the star.

      1c: From 1e, planet 1c would be 4.875x as distant as Luna but 4.03x as large. 1c could appear about 0.8x as large as Luna.

      1d: From 1e, planet 1c would be 2.625x as distant as Luna but 2.9x as large. 1d could appear about 1.1x as large as Luna.

      The star and two planets in the artwork fit within those proportions: 4.3x as large as Sol (or Luna), and 0.5 to 1.1x as large as Luna. The artist took some care with the proportions.

      If the foreground planet is 1d, Trappist-1 would appear 5.76x Sol's diameter, and there'd still be 2 planets that could appear in the sky as depicted.

      Overall, I'm going to say the artist wasn't too far off, especially if the Moon Illusion is applied.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Comment about the artwork...

        Big thumbs up, but you forgot the nerdy science icon!

      2. cray74

        Re: Comment about the artwork...

        Addendum: the article's depiction of Trappist-1 does fall prey to the common mistake of "red dwarfs must appear dim and red in the sky." In fact, a 2500K light source is going to appear fairly white. The surrounding sky and landscape might take on a different, dawn/dusk-like color, but the star itself will look white to human eyes. The following link is an excellent depiction of a red dwarf and its impact on landscape lighting, as well as having a good discussion and supporting references:

        GJ 667Cc

        1. cosmogoblin

          Re: Comment about the artwork...

          And in fact, on any planet, the dominant star will appear white to creatures that evolved eyes while living on said planet.

          Actually I imagine that humans moving to a truly red environment would adapt pretty quickly to perceive it as white - given that we can adapt to wearing "upside-down glasses"!

      3. cosmogoblin
        Happy

        Re: Comment about the artwork...

        You NERD!!!

        Thanks for the work - I was going to do this, you've saved me a lot of effort!

      4. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

        Re: Comment about the artwork...

        It will be a big globe in the sky, quite a bit larger than Sol or Luna

        So - they have discovered Darkover? Quick - I want to go there to gain those interesting psionic genes..

        Laran, here I come.

        Even better if the other planet is Pern. Psionics *and* teleporting dragons..

  6. G2
    Facepalm

    error: spellcheck not available

    "Celcius", really?

    https://web.archive.org/web/20180124103250/https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/01/24/trappist1_planets_water_life/

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: error: spellcheck not available

      Any fule knows that is is spelled centigrade.

      1. ThatOne Silver badge
        Coat

        Re: error: spellcheck not available

        > Any fule knows that is is spelled centigrade.

        ...Which is the offspring of a centipede and a plantigrade.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: error: spellcheck not available

      Conjugate the verb "to of"

      Might of

      Could of

      Should of

      Would of

      Must of

  7. Scroticus Canis
    Holmes

    Trappist-1 ... cool white dwarf star. - Since when?

    Trappist-1 is an "ultra-cool* red dwarf star" according to other more reliable sources. Nothing like what astronomers call a white dwarf.

    The headline stating that two planets "have watery oceans" is definitely missing the "may" in front of "have". Deliberate click baiting? :(

    * Ultra-cool refers to its surface temp. of ± 2500 K, not it dress sense.

    1. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

      Re: Trappist-1 ... cool white dwarf star. - Since when?

      Ultra-cool refers to its surface temp. of ± 2500 K, not it dress sense

      So, Zaphod Beeblebrox-hot? He's so hip he can barely see over his pelvis.

      1. fedoraman
        Joke

        Re: Trappist-1 ... cool white dwarf star. - Since when?

        So cool you could keep a side of meat in him for a week!

  8. Bangem

    They might be the right temp

    but if there's no magnetic field, protecting the planets from solar radiation, any water will simply boil away and life wouldn't stand a chance.

    >points to Mars

    1. Vladimir Plouzhnikov

      Re: They might be the right temp

      "Moderate amount of tidal heating" may mean the cores are actually still liquid while the planets not being gravitationally locked and so capable of sustaining a magnetic field...

      Someone needs to go there and have a look...

      1. Evil Auditor Silver badge

        Re: They might be the right temp

        Someone needs to go there and have a look.

        And nuke the entire site from orbit...

      2. Bangem

        Re: They might be the right temp

        circa 1.5 million year round trip to find out. I'm over it already.

      3. Alistair
        Windows

        Re: They might be the right temp

        @ Vladimir:

        <tosses hand in air>

        Me! Me! Me! Mister Kotter! Mister Kotter!.

        Only so long as I can leave behind 99.999% of management and the triumphalist types.

      4. Mark 85

        Re: They might be the right temp

        "We're 35 light-years away, we have half a tank of gas and one pack of cigarettes. It's night and we're wearing sunglasses."

        "Hit it!!!"

        Sounds like a great road trip to me, we just need some good music in the background.

        1. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

          Re: They might be the right temp

          we just need some good music in the background

          [Cues up Prog playlist].

          Couple of tracks should do it..

  9. SullyTech

    Pack the car folks...

    Best set off now, given that it will take around 685,000 years to get there. By which time all this supposition will be a moot point anyway...

    1. ravenviz Silver badge

      Re: Pack the car folks...

      Not if we all go!

    2. Arthur the cat Silver badge
      Trollface

      Re: Pack the car folks...

      Best set off now, given that it will take around 685,000 years to get there.

      Are we nearly there yet?

      1. Bangem

        Re: Pack the car folks...

        Just 8562 grandkids to go!

    3. Andy 97

      Re: Pack the car folks...

      I watched Idiocracy last night. It didn’t make for positive viewing.

  10. Triumphantape

    39 lightyears?

    My ship can do that in 12 parsecs.

  11. This post has been deleted by its author

  12. Winkypop Silver badge
    Devil

    39 light years from our home world

    And yet, there will already be black, red, and gold towels laid out by the best pools!

  13. Tom 7

    Should be easy to looks for signs of life now

    just look for the signature of long-chain carbon based polymers washed up on the beaches,.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re. aliens.

    If humans ever get there they will probably find that the resident life forms are highly sensitive to light and we might be able to set up a trading post selling them our "ridiculously cheap" IR LEDs for room lighting purposes.

    On the other hand the planets might be deader than mutton.

    They *might* have had life maybe 2 billion years ago but not any more.

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