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There's been a lot of discussion and speculation about our ability to detect likely sites for extraterrestrial life and / or alien civilizations. In a new study, two astronomers surveyed our expanding data on exoplanets to do something like SETI in reverse - i.e., identify which exoplanets could represent vantage points for aliens who might detect and / or monitor us.
FULL STORY: https://www.sciencealert.com/plenty-of-exoplanets-could-be-looking-straight-back-at-us-too
Alien Planets Around 1,000 Nearby Stars Could Be Looking Straight Back at Earth
Astronomers are working hard to catalogue all of the exoplanets visible from Earth, but now two researchers have turned the idea around, to look at which exoplanets are getting a good view of Earth in return.
It turns out there are 1,004 (and counting) main sequence stars, similar to the Sun, with orbiting Earth-like planets that probably have an opportunity to detect chemical traces of life on our own planet. If there's anyone up there, they can see us.
These stars are all within 326 light-years (100 parsecs) of Earth, with the study focusing on the closest exoplanets first.
Data from NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) star catalogue and the Gaia star map was used to make the calculations, and over time the star systems that can view Earth will change.
"If observers were out there searching, they would be able to see signs of a biosphere in the atmosphere of our Pale Blue Dot," says astronomer Lisa Kaltenegger, from Cornell University. "And we can even see some of the brightest of these stars in our night sky without binoculars or telescopes." ...
FULL STORY: https://www.sciencealert.com/plenty-of-exoplanets-could-be-looking-straight-back-at-us-too