event
Friday 16 Nov 2018: Influence of Stellar UV Environment on Detecting Biosignatures and Pre-Biosignatures in the Atmospheres of Earth-like Planets Around Other Stars
Sarah Rugheimer - St Andrews
Newman Red 12:30-13:30
When we observe the first terrestrial exoplanet atmospheres, we expect to find planets around a wide range of stellar types, UV environments, and geological conditions. Since the first exoplanets available for characterization will be likely for M dwarf host stars, understanding the UV environment of these cool stars is a vital step in understanding the atmospheres of these planets. Additionally the atmospheres of these planets will not been fixed in time. Earth itself offers many possible atmospheric states of a planet. We set out to examine how an Earth-like planet at different geological epochs might look around other star types Additionally, we examine the plausibility of detecting prebiotically interesting molecules, such as HCN, NH3, CH4, and C2H6 in an early-Earth type atmosphere around stars with very different UV environments, an M dwarf and a solar analogue.
