Planned Research
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Innovative Areas (Research in a proposed research area)
To clarify whether Earth-like planets with oceans and temperate climates (called habitable planets) exist outside the solar system, we have conducted theoretical investigations on the formation and evolution of planetary atmospheres and obtained predictions that there are significantly more habitable planets around stars cooler than the Sun compared to previous understanding. Meanwhile, by developing a new multi-color camera to be installed on ground-based telescopes and using that camera to follow up on planet candidates discovered by the space telescope TESS, we have found many exoplanets around low-temperature stars.
天文学、惑星科学
宇宙において我々は唯一の存在なのか、他に知的生命体はいるのか、という疑問は、社会共通の関心事であり、多くの人々が関心を持つ科学的かつ哲学的な問題といえる。本研究の成果は、理論上、太陽系外に生命体が住めるような海と大気を持つ惑星が存在しうることを示したものであり、今後の生命惑星探索へと発展する重要な成果である。
