In their search for habitable worlds, astronomers have started to consider exomoons, or those likely orbiting planets outside the solar system. In a new study, a pair of researchers has found that exomoons are just as likely to support life as exoplanets.
The research, conducted by René Heller of Germany's Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam and Rory Barnes of the University of Washington and the NASA Astrobiology Institute, will appear in the January issue of Astrobiology.
About 850 extrasolar planets -- planets outside the solar system -- are known, and most of them are sterile gas giants, similar to Jupiter. Only a few have a solid surface and orbit their host stars in the habitable zone, the circumstellar belt at the right distance to potentially allow liquid surface water and a benign environment.
Heller and Barnes tackled the theoretical question whether such planets could host habitable moons. No such exomoons have yet been discovered but there's no reason to assume they don't exist.
Why wouldn't they exist? To read more, click here.