Scientist says we could find proof of aliens within 25 years

A Swiss astrophysicist believes that we might find evidence of extraterrestrial life within the next 25 years.

Sascha Quanz thinks that we will find proof of life outside our solar system. Quanz said that the technology projects that humanity is working on right now can answer our questions about aliens.

At a recent opening of ETH Zurich’s new Center for the Origin and Prevalence of Life, he said that the first exoplanet was discovered in 1995 by his colleague. Today, we know of more than 5,000 planets that are outside our solar system. 

Citing the James Webb Space Telescope, Quanz said he was quite hopeful, reported Space.

A study in May said that the exoplanets that were found to be as big as our sun are targets for astronomers to find aliens.

Quanz pointed out that most of the planets we are discovering these days have favourable conditions for life being at the perfect distance from their host stars and having the water too.

Studying the atmospheres of these planets with gigantic telescopes like NASA's JWST can help trace life. Quanz does doubt though that the JWST can observe planets as small as ours.

New instruments solely to search for extraterrestrial life are being built, however.  One of them is the mid-infrared ELT imager and spectrograph (METIS) built by the European Southern Observatory in Chile.