05-12-11 SETI to hunt for Aliens on Keplers worlds

When searching for extraterrestrial intelligence,its a really tricky job to know where to look.Space is big,and the odds of detecting a transmission from an alien are vanishingly small.But with the help of NASAs Kepler Space Telescope,some of the guesswork is about to be cut out of the SETI equation.On Monday,the Kepler science team announced the confirmation of a super-Earth orbiting right in the middle of the habitable zone of its sun-like star.The world,called Kepler-22b,therefore has some of the qualities of a world where life as we know it may exist.The habitable zone is a region surrounding a star where its energy is just right for liquid water to exist on its surface.Any closer,the water would turn to vapor,any further,and the water would turn to ice.We have no clue whether Kepler-22b is a rocky world (like Earth) or a gaseous world (like Neptune).However,we do know its location would make it a rather cozy place for Earth Brand Life to live,if there is water,that is.Though there are plenty of unknowns,Kepler-22b would make a nice place to begin searching for extraterrestrial intelligence.If there is water,and if its a rocky world,then perhaps some intelligent lifeforms had the chance to evolve.