2019-02-15

Ballard on exoplanets

Today was a great talk by Sarah Ballard (MIT) about the future of exoplanet research, with a concentration on the search for habitable planets. She made a strong argument for looking around low-mass stars. Of course I am suspicious that life can form around low-mass stars because the UV photons might be crucial!

She also emphasized a lot her results on two different populations of planets around M stars. I am not sure I like this description of her result: The fact that she gets a better fit with two simple populations than with one doesn't mean that there are two populations; there might just be one complex population not well described by a simple form! But it is a productive idea in the sense of generating and inspiring new projects.

And despite my criticisms and concerns, I loved this talk; it showed great vision for the future and she is taking great steps now towards that future. The methods and the process are good; my objections are all about subtle points of interpretation and discussion.

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