Science has advanced at great speeds throughout the years, but the idea of exploring the moon to see if humans could benefit from it is an extraordinary thing, but universally dangerous. What does all this mean? Are humans no longer be able to survive on planet earth? What is the fate that awaits us?
NASA commanded a bomb to the moon last Thursday, October 9th, 2009, at 5:12 pm ET, the LCROSS mission that supposedly will find water and/or ice on the moon. It installed on the moon a quantum of electronic instruments to visualize the inside of the moon. LCROSS will be able to identify the presence of water, ice or vapor on impact and perhaps can give us an answer to the question of whether or not there is water on the moon.
What did the NASA scientists see? Michael Bicay, the science director of NASA's Ames Research Center said, "It's hard to tell what we saw here." It has not yet been established whether there is water on the moon or not, but at this very moment, that theory is being studied.
NASA has many other plans, such as sending the largest telescope that has ever been sent into space, scheduled to launch in 2014. The James Webb Space Telescope will have a long 5-year mission and it will orbit in space, 1.51 million km from the Earth, about 3.92 times farther away from Earth than the moon.
This telescope is the most advanced, and NASA professionals will be able to see 300 light-years away, the most extraordinary distance they could ever imagine seeing. The Webb telescope weighs 6.200 kg at a cost of $ 3.5 million dollars.
Scientists will be able to examine the entire universe itself, and they believe they might be able to discover many other planets and stars they've never before seen. But this telescope can easily get lost in space as it will go to an unreachable distance for a human being. NASA could either fail or succeed, perhaps bringing us more danger to our planet but they still will eventually lead this extraordinary and risky project. Well, we will not know of their success until the very moment of launch.
And lastly, scientists have made an extraordinary discovery that is named "Second Earth", a second planet Earth that is made of rock and its condition is so perfect it can be presumed to have water and minerals essential for a human to survive in it. It is located 20 light years away in the constellation Libra. This is the closest planet to be identical to the planet Earth than any other before known planet.
Stephane Udry, an astronomer on the project at the Geneva Observatory in Switzerland said, "We would not be surprised if there is life on this planet."
Also the David Latham-Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics Dimension says that: "Finding a rocky planet with an Earth-like density brings us one step closer to discovering another planet similar to our own. A twin-Earth beyond the solar system could Provide the best chance of finding life elsewhere in the universe. Finding a second Earth could happen any time now.”
Creg Laughlin of the University of California of Santa Cruz also states that, "We'll find an Earth-mass planet by 2010 and an Earth-Mass planet that is potentially habitable by 2012."
Many studies are going on in regards to space by NASA, but to study the universe and all of its secrets is endless. But let’s hold out hope that someday we humans might discover another existing Earth.
