HONG KONG: The search for intelligent life has pointed its ears towards a new Earth-like planet discovered by the Kepler space telescope late last year.
The Allen radio telescope array at Hat Creek, California, was tilted towards a piece of the Pisces constellation which has been under Kepler’s careful scrutiny in recent years — it’s sensitive instruments seeking the tiny “wobbles” in starlight which indicate the passing of an orbiting planet.
One such ‘wobble’ indicated the presence of a planet within a star’s “Goldilocks” zone — an orbit which provides the right temperature range to support liquid water.