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SETI@Home needs your help!

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Simon:
Hi Urs,

I don't think much will change; if anything, it should become easier to use your bank account for PayPal transactions.

However, I haven't checked in depth - if I find out anything, I'll let you know :)

Regards,
Simon.

Urs Echternacht:
Thanks in advance, Simon.

Danke im voraus, Simon.

ralph:
One "berkeley coordination" question.

There's a NASA Probe, Kepler, that JPL is involved with, that is confirming more and more extrasolar planets.

Other research at Berkeley is finding more frequent occurrences of extrasolar planets. 
Has that work been able to characterize the type of stars likely to host a solar system with Earth-like planets?   If it has, has the SETI projects (Allen Array, SETI@home/Serendip)

Is there any plan to try to coordinate observations, or focus more on planetary systems that seems to support extrasolar planets? 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_source_SHGb02%2B14a might be an interesting place to look at with the Kepler probe, to see if there are any evidences of extrasolar planets there.

It seems like most of the extrasolar discoveries are based on optical observation, and it would be interesting to compare SETI's radio-telescope observations with the orbital paths of the known extrasolar planets.

Josef W. Segur:
The Kepler probe hasn't found any earthlike planets yet, it needs to wait for a second crossing of a planet in front of its star to determine the orbital period, and a third crossing to be sure the first two were the same planet. IOW, the full 3.5 years staring at the same 10 by 10 degree area are required for it to confirm earthlike planets around stars similar to ours. If they get an extension beyond that planned lifetime of the project, it's unlikely they would change to another area to observe, it would be better science to refine the data they've gathered by further observation. In any case, Kepler isn't the right instrument to make detailed observations of a specific source, it is made for covering a broad field.

What they have done so far is look at one already known supermassive planet orbitting HAT-P-7 very quickly so several crossings were observed. From that data they know that Kepler is working very well, it was even able to detect the light reflected from the planet as it moved in its orbit and more of the lighted side was facing us, and the reduction in light as the planet went behind the star.

SETI@home is a specific kind of search, designed for maximum sensitivity using data which is almost free because we tap off whatever is being observed by others. For any kind of observing program which is targetted at specific locations for SETI, the funding problems are far more acute. S@H barely has enough money to keep operating as is. But of course Berkeley is involved in several other kinds of SETI efforts.

I do hope Kepler finds that earthlike planets are relatively common, perhaps that would stimulate enough public interest so SETI funding will be easier. It would certainly ensure that additional space observatories with enhanced capability would be launched, though that would take several years.
                                                                             Joe

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