This week, NASA announced the discovery of a new system of alien worlds that might support life, and space fans around the world are freaking out about what this might mean for the future of interstellar travel.
Wednesday, NASA announced it had discovered seven alien planets orbiting the nearby TRAPPIST-1 star, and three of them were rocky Earth-like worlds in the habitable zone that might support liquid water, and therefore life.
When NASA talks about finding life on other worlds, its referring to microorganisms and not full blown Star Trek-style aliens, but that hasn’t stopped the TRAPPIST-1 discovery team from hosting a website with a number of science fiction stories.
The website, fittingly named trappist.one, hosts information on the discovery, NASA-designed travel posters, infographics, artistic videos detailing what life might be like on the newly discovered alien worlds, and a series of sci-fi stories and poems.
One story, “The terminator” by Laurence Suhner, was published in Nature and tells the story of a girl who travels to the TRAPPIST-1 system to sprinkle her mother’s ashes.
To read more, click here.