EVEN as a cash-strapped NASA shelves plans for a costly mission to hunt for Earth-like planets, a novel scheme has emerged that promises to achieve the same goal for a fraction of the cost. Called New World Observer, the proposal will be submitted to NASA next month by Webster Cash, director of the University of Colorado’s Center for Astrophysics and Space Astronomy. It could begin spotting “exo-Earths” as early as 2013.
Budget cuts forced NASA to indefinitely postpone its planned Terrestrial Planet Finder (TPF) mission. This would have required the agency to build an expensive new telescope capable of spotting…
