March 14, 2008 J.D. Harrington Headquarters, Washington 202-358-5241 j.d.harrington@xxxxxxxx Ray Villard Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md. 410-338-4514 villard@xxxxxxxxx MEDIA ADVISORY: M08-058 HUBBLE DETECTS ORGANIC MOLECULE ON AN EXTRASOLAR PLANET WASHINGTON - NASA will hold a media teleconference at 2 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, March 19, to report on the first-ever detection of the organic molecule methane in the atmosphere of a planet orbiting a distant star. Though the planet is too hot to support life as we know it, the finding demonstrates the ability to detect organic molecules spectroscopically around Earth-like planets in habitable zones around stars. Briefing participants are: - Dr. Mark Swain, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. - Dr. Sara Seager, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge This unique discovery, made with Hubble's Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS), will be featured in the March 20 issue of the journal Nature. To participate in the teleconference, reporters must contact Ray Villard at 410-338-4514 or Cheryl Gundy at 410-338-4707 at the Space Telescope Science Institute by noon on March 19 for the call-in number and passcode. At the start of the briefing, images and supporting graphics will be posted on the Web at: http://hubblesite.org/news/2008/11 Audio of the teleconference will be streamed live on NASA's Web site at: http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio For more information about NASA's Hubble Space Telescope on the Web, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/hubble -end- To subscribe to the list, send a message to: hqnews-subscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To remove your address from the list, send a message to: hqnews-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
