Astronomers announced Thursday that they had detected the most promising “suggestions” or potential life on a planet beyond our solar system, although other scientists expressed skepticism.
There has been a vigorous debate in scientific circles about whether the planet K2-18BThat is 124 years away in Leo’s constellation, it could be an oceanic world capable of organizing microbial life, at least.
Using the James Webb Space TelescopeA team of British-United States researchers detected signs of two chemicals in the planet’s atmosphere that are considered “biosignuras” that indicate extraterrestrial life.
On earth, dimethyl sulphide chemicals (DMS) and dimethyl disulfide occur only for life, mostly microscopic seaweed called phytoplankton.
The researchers emphasized the caution, saying that more observations were needed to confirm these findings and that they do not announce a definitive discovery.
But the implications could be huge, according to Nikku Madhusudhan, astrophysicist at the University of Cambridge and main author of the study, published in the Astrophysical Letters magazine.
Madhusudhan told BBC News that he hopes to obtain the evidence that gets soon.
“This is the strongest evidence so far there is a possible life,” he said. “I can realistically say that we can confirm this signal in one or two.”
NASA, CSA, ESA, J. Olmsted (STSCI), Science: N. Madhusudhan (University of Cambridge)/brochure through Reuters 
But external experts indicated disputes about previous discoveries about the Exoplanet, adding that the thesis chemicals could have been created by an unknown means have nothing to do with life.
“Gold Ricitos” zone
More than eight times the mass of the earth and 2.5 times larger, K2-18B is strange among the approximately 6,000 explanet discovered so far, since its star orbits in a habitable area or “Goldilocks”.
This means that it is too hot or too cold to have liquid water, consultant the most important ingredient in life.
Telescopes observe such distant exoplanets when they cross their star, which allows astronomers to analyze how molecules block the light that flows through their atmosphere.
In 2023, the Webb Telescope Methane and carbon dioxide detected In the atmosphere of K2-18b, the first time such carbon-based molecules were detected in an exoplanet in a habitable area.
It also detected weak signs of chemical DM, which led astronomers to convert Webb to the planet again a year ago, this time using its middle infrared instrument to detect different light wavelengths.
They found much stronger signs of chemicals, still thought well below the “five sigma” threshold of statistical importance that scientists see for such discoveries.
Even if the results are confirmed, it would not necessarily mean that the planet houses life.
Last year, scientists found DMS traces in a kite, which suggested that it can occur in a non -organic way and perhaps not a “biosignature.”
However, the concentration of the chemical observed in K2-18B seems to be thousands of times stronger than the levels on the earth, probably suggestion of biological origin, said Madhusudhan.
“Hellishermente hot”
K2-18B has long been considered the main candidate for a “Planet Hycean” -A an oceanic world than Earth with an atmosphere rich in hydrogen.
The planets hycean, like the Earth, are covered with oceans and have hydrogen -rich atmospheres, an element that is essential for life. Many of the planets are larger and more hot than the Earth, up to 2.6 times larger than our planet and reaching atmospheric temperatures of up to almost 200 degrees Celsius, or 392 degrees Fahrenheit.
University of Cambridge through Reuters 
It would not be expected that these planets are the home of intelligent alien life, but of small microbes similar to those of the Earth’s oceans billions of years ago.
“Hycean planets open a completely new way in our search for life in other places,” said Madhusudhan previously.
Some investigations have questioned whether the planets currently proposed are too close to their stars to support liquid water, including K2-18B, which orbits its star every 33 days.
Raymond Pierrehumbert, professor of planetary physics at the University of Oxford, has conducted separate research that indicates that K2-18B is too hot for life.
If the planet had water, it would be “infernily hot” and uninhabitable, he told AFP, and added that the oceans or lava were more plausible.
Sara Seaver, Professor of Planetary Sciences at MIT, asked for patience, pointing out previous water vapor claims in the K2-18b atmosphere that turned out to be a different gas.
Madhusudhan estimated that he would take only 16 to 24 hours of the Webb time to reach the threshold of five sigma, which could happen in the coming years.
The current three Sigma is comparable to the chances of turning a currency 10 times and obtaining the same result every time, explained the University of Cambridge Stephen Burgess.
Five Sigma would get that result after 20 flips, and it would mean that “we can be very sure that this observation is not just a finding of Chans,” he said.
Even beyond K2-18B, Madhusudhan said that Webb and future telescopes could allow humanity to discover life outside our native planet before one might think.
“This could be the turning point, where suddenly the fundamental issue that we are alone in the universe is capable of answering,” he said.
