Jeroen Search – Alpha Centauri

The Alpha Centauri system is seen by many as the best candidate to explore for signs of life.  As the gravitationally bound system of the closest stars and exoplanets to Earth’s Solar System is located at 4.37 light-years from the sun it would take about 100 years for a nuclear pulse propulsion interstellar spacecraft to reach it, and another 4 years would be necessary for the data to begin reach Earth.

Alpha Centauri, has at least one Earth-sized planet orbiting one of its three stars. Dangerous x-rays from that red dwarf star make life unlikely there, but the prospects may be much better for the other two sun-like stars, if any as-yet undiscovered planets orbit them.

With so many exoplanets being discovered now, it is natural of course to wonder about the star system closest to us. Could life exist there? For the one planet known to exist there so far, the results are not encouraging. But if there are others, and most planetary systems appear to have more than one planet, then the odds are a bit more in life’s favor. We won’t know for sure until/if we find additional planets in the Alpha Centauri system. But even if we don’t, many other worlds are being discovered on a regular basis now, and a growing number appear to have conditions at least suitable for habitability, if not life itself.

So far the question still remains, will we find ever planets in an environment conducive to life as we know it?