NASA says it has discovered evidence of a nearby super-Earth that is located within its star’s habitable zone. Its unique location means that the super-Earth could possibly be habitable, meaning it could hold evidence of alien life.

The planet is known as TOI-0715 b, and it’s about one and a half times as wide as our own planet, NASA explains. The planet orbits within the “conservative” habitable zone of its parent star, and that means it could be the right temperature for liquid water to form on the planet’s surface.

Obviously, discovering a possibly habitable planet is big news. What’s even more intriguing about it, though, is that the planet is just 127 light-years away, putting it within our celestial backyard, so to speak.

Image source: NASA, ESA, CSA, Dani Player (STScI)

Now, obviously that’s still way further than humans can travel in space right now. However, it is nice to know that a habitable planet could be so close instead of being located millions or billions of light-years away. What makes the appearance of this planet even more exciting, though, is that it could have a partner planet nearby.

TOI-175 b joins the growing list of possibly habitable super-Earths that we have discovered. While the planet needs to be more heavily scrutinized by the James Webb space telescope, its discovery is a move in the right direction because now we can look for signs of an atmosphere, which is important for harboring life.

Just because a planet is located within the habitable zone of a star doesn’t necessarily mean that it is habitable or that it has an atmosphere of any kind. Further research into the planet, as well as its possible partner planet, will only help us learn more.

Finding a possibly habitable super-Earth so close means we can study it more in-depth than we could if it were millions of light-years away. But that doesn’t mean that we’ll learn anything definitive, at least not until scientists have poured over the data for hours and hours.

(Photo: Iowa Soybean Association / Joseph Hopper)

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February 5, 2024

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By Dr. Chris Hay, Affiliate Assistant Professor, Department of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering, Iowa State University

Drainage water recycling is a practice that combines crop production benefits for the farmer and water quality benefits downstream. A drainage water recycling system captures subsurface (tile) drainage and potentially water from surface runoff or other sources, and stores it in a reservoir for supplemental irrigation. The Research Center for Farming Innovation (RCFI) has been collaborating with researchers from Iowa State University to evaluate this practice in Iowa.

Three sites are being monitored for the impacts of drainage water recycling on crop yield and water quality. Each site is uniquely designed.

The first site, near Story City was installed in 2015. It captures subsurface drainage from about 20 acres that is supplemented by water pumped from a nearby creek.

The reservoir for the second site, near Lake City, was constructed in a waterway fed by the outflow from a large drainage district main and has an outlet structure for when inflows exceed the reservoir storage capacity.

The third site, near Dayton, uses a sump to pump water from an adjacent county drainage main into an excavated reservoir.

Crop yield

At the Story City site, 60 acres are irrigated and another 100 acres are not irrigated. However, the acres have the same soil type and management, serving as a good control for comparing the irrigated and rainfed yields.

Corn yield data has been available since the system began operation in 2016. Yields were greater in the irrigated portion of the field in every year except for 2018, when there was ample rain and no irrigation was used, and in 2020, when the derecho damaged the center pivot.

Yield increases ranged from -7 bushels per acre in 2018, when there was no irrigation, to 119 bushels per acre in 2017. The yield increases are largely explained by differences in precipitation, with 2017 precipitation 32% less than the 30-year average whereas precipitation in 2018 was well above the 30-year average. The overall average corn yield increase from the supplemental irrigation was 35 bushels per acre. In addition to greater overall yields, there was less year-to-year variability in yield in the irrigated portion of the field. Yield monitor data show that yields were more consistent in the irrigated portion within individual years.

Water quality

With the two new sites in Lake City and Dayton, there are now four site years of water quality monitoring to evaluate the water quality benefits of drainage water recycling.

To understand the water balance of each system, inflows and outflows were measured. Those inflows and outflows and the water stored in the reservoir were also sampled for nitrogen and phosphorus concentrations.

Other water losses from evaporation and seepage and nutrient losses in the seepage were estimated. The nutrient load reductions from the drainage water recycling systems could be calculated with the flow amounts and nutrient concentrations.

In all four site years, nitrogen loads were substantially reduced. This was from a combination of concentration reductions from storage within the reservoirs and nitrogen recycled back into the field through supplemental irrigation.

Nitrogen in the irrigation water was assumed to be available for plant uptake or would otherwise be reduced, and nitrogen load reductions were calculated as nitrogen in the inflows minus nitrogen in any outflows and seepage.

On a percentage basis, nitrogen load reductions ranged from 63% to 92%. Nitrogen load reductions at Story City and Dayton were 90% and 92% with no outflows other than seepage.

At Lake City, nitrogen load reductions varied by year. With greater inflows in 2022, more water and nitrogen were released back to the stream in reservoir outflows, so nitrogen load reductions were less. In the drier conditions of 2023, reservoir inflows were less, outflows were minimal, and the nitrogen load reduction was greater.

Looking at load reductions in terms of the total amount of nitrogen removed shows the differences in the system designs.

Dayton is entirely filled from pumped inflows, and inflows to Story City are largely pumped from the stream. Therefore, the water pumped in is only enough to fill the reservoir, so the inflow amounts of nitrogen were less than at Lake City.

At Lake City, all the discharge from the upstream drainage district main passes through the Lake City reservoir. So, even though some of the water and nitrogen exceeded the reservoir storage capacity and was released back to the stream, there was still an opportunity for nitrogen reduction from treatment as it passed through the reservoir.

Although 2022 at Lake City had the smallest percentage reduction, it had the greatest overall load reduction of more than 2,700 lbs. of nitrogen.

Conclusions

Drainage water recycling has shown strong potential as a practice that boosts crop production and improves water quality. Research continues on these sites and will hopefully expand to more sites. Additional site years will allow us to better understand how drainage water recycling performs at different sites and under different weather conditions which will then help us better understand the economics of these systems.

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(NEW YORK) — Could a recently discovered “super-Earth” have the potential temperature and conditions to sustain life?

The new exoplanet is situated “fairly close to us” — only 137 light-years away — and orbits within a “habitable zone,” according to NASA.

Astronomers say the planet, dubbed TOI-715 b, is about one and a half times the width of Earth and orbits a small, reddish star. The same system also might harbor a second, Earth-sized planet, which, if confirmed, “would become the smallest habitable-zone planet discovered by TESS [the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite] so far,” NASA said in a Jan. 31 press release.

Due to the super-Earth’s distance from its parent star, it could be in a conservative “habitable zone” and harbor the right temperature for liquid water to form on its surface, which is essential to sustain life, according to the agency, which also added that “several other factors would have to line up, of course.”

NASA said the measurements of the habitable zone — “a narrower and potentially more robust definition than the broader ‘optimistic’ habitable zone” — put the newly discovered planet, and possibly the smaller Earth-sized planet, in “prime position” from its parent star.

The agency said that because of the short distance the super-Earth orbits from its parent star, a red dwarf that’s smaller and cooler than our Earth’s sun, a “year” for the planet is equal to 19 Earth days.

The tighter orbits mean the “planets can be more easily detected and more frequently observed,” NASA said.

Since its launch in 2018, TESS has been adding to astronomers’ stockpile of habitable-zone exoplanets, such as TOI-715 b, that could be more closely scrutinized by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, the agency said.

The Webb telescope is designed to not only detect exoplanets but “explore the composition of their atmospheres, which could offer clues to the possible presence of life,” NASA said.

The super-Earth research and discovery was led by Georgina Dransfield at the University of Birmingham in the U.K. and published in the “Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society” journal in January.

The findings mark another step forward in astronomers’ mission to understand what atmospheric conditions are needed to sustain life and further explore the characteristics of exoplanets beyond our solar system, NASA said.

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Kia has recalled about 1,200 electric vehicles (EVs) because their drive shafts can break, causing a loss of all power.

Recalled models include:

Kia tells federal safety regulators “the left-hand drive shaft in the subject Niro EV vehicles and rear inner drive shaft in the subject EV6 vehicles may have been improperly heat-treated.” Heat treating helps determine the strength of a metal, so “an improperly heat-treated drive shaft may break under load resulting in a loss of motive power.”

Dealers will replace the affected drive shafts with new, properly heat-treated parts.

Recall repairs, by law, are free. Many cars are recalled, often more than once, during their lifespan. Automakers try to contact every owner but don’t always reach them all. Find out whether your car has any outstanding recalls with the easy VIN tool at our recall center.