Using the Moon as a mirror, scientists have confirmed that the Earth is habitable

Astronomers have come up with a new way to search for exoplanets and potentially habitable worlds - using their satellites. They checked this on the example of the Moon and the Earth.







During the January 2019 lunar eclipse, scientists from NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) managed to detect ozone in the Earth's atmosphere using the Hubble Space Telescope. Only they watched not for the Earth itself, but for the light reflected from the surface of the Moon.



The search for habitable worlds is one of the main goals of many space research and development. But how to understand that an exoplanet is inhabited? We know for sure that the Earth is inhabited, which is why scientists use it as a control sample.



Of course, life on other planets can be very different from ours at its most basic level. Therefore, astrophysicists, astrobiologists and planetary scientists often say "life as we know it."



Ozone is a photochemical by-product of molecular oxygen. And oxygen is essential for life as we know it.



In general, an interesting experiment that showed that there is ozone in the Earth's atmosphere, and therefore, probably, oxygen. And so, probably, and life.



This is the first material that our Telegram channel Funscience posts on habr.com, don't judge strictly.