1. 1 The Search for Extraterrestrial Life What have we been preparing for in this unit?

2. 2 What is Extraterrestrial Life? Life that does not originate from Earth. It is often also referred to as alien life.

3. 3 What does NASA Hope to Gain from Searching for Extraterrestrial Life? Learn more about Earth. Learn more about Life. Gain technology. Learn more about ourselves. It is inspiring. Understand the history of the Earth, the Solar System and our Galaxy. It is cool!

4. 4 What are We Looking For? We are looking for extraterrestrial life. Evidence of how the solar system was formed Earth-like planets –Places that support life as we understand it –We are looking in the Goldilocks zone: a place that isn’t too far from the sun (cold) but also not too close (hot) - it’s just right!

5. 5 News! Read the article that you have been given. Write a short summary of the main points in your article as well as its relevance to the search for extraterrestrial life. When you are done with the article, wait quietly for the others to finish. When everyone in your group is done, each person should share their summary to the group.

6. 6 Where is Everyone? The Fermi Paradox basic points are: –The sun is a young star. There are billions of stars in the galaxy that are billions of years older. –Some of these stars likely have Earth-like planets which, if the Earth is typical, may develop intelligent life. –Presumably some of these civilizations will develop interstellar travel, as Earth seems likely to do. –At any practical pace of interstellar travel, the galaxy can be completely colonized in just a few tens of millions of years. According to this line of thinking, the Earth should have already been colonized or at least visited. But no convincing evidence of this exists. Furthermore, no confirmed signs of intelligence elsewhere have been spotted, either in our galaxy or the more than 80 billion other galaxies of the observable universe.

7. 7 What Will We Learn? If we understand the needs of life that our planet currently provides for us, then we will be able to look for those things in other planets and possibly find life there. The hope is that we will find that we are not alone; we aren’t limited by this planet; and ultimately we learn more about life.