Gin and tonic serves to restrict the habitable zone of the stars - La Provincia

A team of astronomers based in the Oxford University The definition of habitable zone, the region around a star where a planet could support life, has been restricted to the ideal, using as an illustration the composition of the gin tonic.

Most of the work in this area has focused on planets that may be suitable for life. "Until now, however, little work has been devoted to deciding on which of the potentially habitable planets might it be worth existing"they say.

"To this end, we present the Really Habitable Zone (ZRH), defined as the region around a star where there is likely to be abundance of gins and acceptable tonics ", argues the team, led by Trillian Pomalgu and Marven F Pedbost and who publish results on arXIv.

"Gin, in essence, is alcohol that has been flavored with a wide variety of 'botanical' species," the authors write. "A precise definition of 'botanical' is lacking, so we assume it is the equivalent of an astronomer's use of 'metal', which includes almost everything in the universe except a few common ingredients. Everything is a metal, apart from hydrogen and helium, and everything is a botanist apart from water and alcohol, "they argue.

Spectroscopic analysis shows that gin contains juniper as a primary botanist. Juniper grows in a variety of conditions on Earth. But how resistant is exo-juniper and what is its expansion? According to the authors, "we must expect exo-juniper to exist on a wide range of planets."

Citrus fruits are not as hardy as juniper, so exo-citrus worlds may be rarer than exo-juniper worlds. "In contrast to juniper-related considerations, the region around a star where conditions are suitable for the cultivation of lemons or limes, essential ingredients necessary for the gin and tonic drink, is sensitive to a number of factors. Citrus necessary thrive in temperatures that range between 21 and 38 ° C and they require a constant supply of H2O. "

As reported by 'Universe Today,' in the absence of more astrobiological studies that delve into this line, the authors of this original investigation propose that "efforts be directed in the near future to investigate only those planets whose orbits are within the HRZ" and make them initial targets for the JWST space telescope.