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\u3010ELSI\u3011A new way to detect life beyond Earth without knowing what life looks like | IFs<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A research team of Specially Appointed Associate Professor Harrison B. Smith of ELSI has developed a new approach to detecting life beyond Earth that does not rely on identifying specific biological markers.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.initiative.ifs.isct.ac.jp\/en\/report\/rid1854\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u3010ELSI\u3011A new way to detect life beyond Earth without knowing what life looks like | IFs\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A research team of Specially Appointed Associate Professor Harrison B. 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Iterative terraformation The concept behind the model is simple: life can travel to and terraform planets around other stars. In doing so, the planet that life travels to becomes more similar to the planet it came from. In this example, life from a planet resembling Earth travels to a red planet. The process plays out again and again. Each time, after being terraformed, a planet becomes more \\\"Earth-like\\\" than would be expected from random chance, given the locations of the planets. However, the focus is not on identifying Earth-like planets. Instead, the aim is to identify any group of planets that are more similar to each other than would be expected by chance, and are localized in space. This technique is agnostic: it does not require making assumptions about habitability or passing judgment on the \\\"kinds of planets\\\" that are amenable to life. Credit: Harrison B. 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