Scientists are predicting that the Earth has 1.75 billion years before it moves out of the "habitable zone" and towards the sun. According to findings published today in the scientific journal "Astrobiology" the Earth will at some point move too close to the sun to sustain life. The extreme heat will cause oceans to boil and evaporate. The temperatures will be so high not even bacteria will be able to survive. The research team also looked into the idea that planets beyond our solar system could host life. The research was conducted by a team from the University of East Anglia, led by Andrew Rushby.
"We used the 'habitable zone' concept to make these estimates," Rushby said in "Astrobiology." "This is the distance from a planet's star at which temperatures are conducive to having liquid water on the surface." "We used stellar evolution models to estimate the end of a planet's habitable lifetime by determining when it will no longer be in the habitable zone. We estimate that Earth will cease to be habitable somewhere between 1.75 and 3.25 billion years from now," Rushby said. Once Earth enters the suns "hot zone" it will no longer be able to host life causing a massive extinction of all the planet's inhabitants.
For human beings the cataclysmic extinction of the species would begin before the planet entered the hot zone. Once the climate change begins to accelerate human will not be able to handle the difference in temperature. "Humans would be in trouble with even a small increase in temperature," Rushby said. "Near the end, only microbes in niche environments would be able to endure the heat." Rushby said that the human race's best bet for survival is relocating to Mars. The red planet close to Earth and "will remain in the habitable zone until the end of the sun's lifetime - 6 million years from now."
The research team was also looking into the possibility that there may be life on distant planets outside our solar system. Astronomers have identified almost 1,000 planets outside of the Milky Way. Using these planets as examples and using what science knows about the evolutionary nature of the habitability of planets the team looked to discover which of these planets are currently in the beginning stages of hosting life. "To date, no true Earth analogue planet has been detected," Rushby said. "But it is possible that there will be a habitable, Earth-like planet within 10 light-years, which is very close in astronomical terms."
Rushby also said it would take hundreds of thousands of years to reach this hypothetical planet with man's current technology. The team looked at two planets Kepler 22b and Glises 581d during their research and were surprised by what they found. "One of the planets that we applied our model to is Kepler 22b, which has a habitable lifetime of 4.3 to 6.1 billion years. Even more surprising is Gliese 581d which has a massive habitable lifetime of between 42.4 to 54.7 billion years. This planet may be warm and pleasant for 10 times the entire time that our solar system has existed!"
Rushby also pointed out in his "Astrobiology" paper that is takes millions of years for intelligent life to develop on a habitable planet. The planets that the team is studying may be in the extremely early stages of life. "We had insects 400 million years ago, dinosaurs 300 million years ago and flowering plants 130 million years ago," he said. "Modern humans have only been around for the last 200,000 years - so it takes a really long time for intelligent life to develop."
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