The Second Earth Initiative

Since the dawn of time, humans have wondered whether we are alone in the Universe. "The Second Earth Initiative" aims to design, build, install, and operate an extreme-precision radial velocity spectrograph on a dedicated modest-sized telescope to discover temperate Earth-mass planets around the brightest Sun-like stars in the sky. The discovered planets will be exceptionally valuable, because they will, in perpetuity, be the best targets for biosignature searches (signs of life in their atmospheres) due to their proximity to our Solar System. Characterizing these planets using next-generation telescopes will allow us to discover if life exists elsewhere and determine whether Earth's biosphere is common or unique in the Universe.