China announced the plan to conquer the “2nd Earth” – Information Technology

“Earth 2.0” – China’s future space telescope – will spend 4 years around the Lagrange 2 point of the Sun – Earth on a mission to head towards the sky above the galactic center.

According to Space, the project proposed by the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory (SAO) and expected to be carried out this summer will help China join the race to find the “Second Earth” that the US and other countries are looking for. European countries are also actively hunting.

Those will be planets about the size of Earth, similar orbits, orbiting planets like the Sun – the first conditions for life to have a chance to arise.

Earth and planets that have been determined to be quite similar to Earth have been found – Photo: NASA

The space telescope called Earth 2.0, or “Earth version 2.0”, will be located about 1.5 million km from Earth, orbiting the Lagrange 2 point of the Sun – Earth. Lagrange points or “race points” are positions in interplanetary space where an object will only be weakly affected by the gravitational force of the two large objects it lies between, giving the telescope a place to live. Virtually quiet to carry out the task.

Earth 2.0 owns 7 small telescopes, which will cover the sky towards the center of the galaxy, trying to catch the signs of the planets as they pass through the space between the parent star and Earth, causing the brightness to change. change.

It’s also the most common way space agencies hunt for exoplanets, because they’re often too far away to see directly. Finding planets with Earth-like basic conditions will be important because it helps scientists around the world narrow down the hunt for life.

These planetary candidates can be further tracked with ground-based telescopes to determine mass and density via radial velocity measurement, some of which orbit bright stars that can be further tracked. by spectroscopy,” Professor Ge Jian from SAO told Space by e-mail.

Earth 2.0’s field of view coincides with the area that NASA’s Kepler has tracked for the past nine years, but Earth 2.0 will have a much larger field of view, allowing it to capture a wider area and see more stars. If the plan goes well, Earth 2.0 will be released in 2026.

Kepler observed half a million stars and 2,392 exoplanets during its incredible mission.