Cynthia Vodovoz 1973 Alabama UFO Abduction and Ongoing Alien Encounters

 Streets of Silence version...surname incorrect. Also as soon as Budd Hopkins gets involved all bets are off whether genuine originally or not.

Cynthia Vodovoz on Her 1973 Alabama UFO Abduction and Ongoing Alien Encounters

The First Observation and Vehicle Malfunction

In October 1973, 12-year-old Cynthia Vadavas and her mother were driving along US 31 near Gardendale, heading to a dance class in Birmingham. During this night journey, Cynthia noticed an unusual object in the sky. She described it as a large, round, bright green object with a yellow ring around it, visible above the treeline and keeping pace with their vehicle.

The object's presence was concerning enough that Cynthia's mother verbally wondered if it might land. As they continued driving just north of Gardendale, the object began descending directly in front of their car. Suddenly and without warning, their vehicle stalled near an intersection. Cynthia observed that several other cars in the vicinity had also stopped.

The object appeared to hover near some power lines, seeming "bigger than a plane" according to Cynthia's recollection. Her mother rolled down the window despite Cynthia's distress. In the car next to them, a man with a lit-up face leaned toward them when Cynthia's mother asked if he thought it was a UFO, to which he replied affirmatively.

Subsequent Memory Gap and Lost Time

Following this exchange, Cynthia recalled feeling an unusual heaviness throughout her body as a bright light shone into their car. She found herself unable to move, as if paralyzed by an unknown force. This was her last clear memory before an abrupt discontinuity in her recollection.

The next thing Cynthia remembered was sitting in the car with her feet in her mother's lap. A car door slammed against her back, which seemed to awaken both Cynthia and her mother simultaneously. Her mother frantically attempted to restart the vehicle, which eventually started, allowing them to continue their journey to the dance class. They arrived approximately 40 minutes late.

In 1986, thirteen years after the incident, Cynthia met with Dr. Richard Neal, a hypnotist, to explore her missing memories. Noted UFO researcher Bud Hopkins also participated in the case. Under hypnosis, Cynthia recalled seeing numerous stopped cars at the intersection, initially assuming there had been an accident. She described "mayhem" with people screaming and gesturing before becoming suddenly subdued.

According to her hypnotic regression, three small whitish beings approached her door, opened it, and pulled her from the vehicle despite her resistance. She recalled being transported into a craft with a bright white interior and placed on a table alongside another young girl with "sandy curly hair."

Family Relocation and Incident Dismissal

Following the incident, Cynthia's mother contacted her father, Irvin Vadavas, who worked with the Federal Aviation Administration in Birmingham. He immediately dismissed their experience, suggesting the object was simply a NASA rocket test.

The following year, the family relocated to Washington, and Cynthia later moved to Los Angeles to pursue dance. Despite these changes, she remained troubled by the incident and couldn't dismiss it from her mind.

In 1990, Frank Sikora, a civil rights historian and writer for the Birmingham News, interviewed the now 28-year-old Cynthia about her experience. Jeff Ballard, the state director of the Mutual UFO Network at that time, hoped Cynthia's public account might encourage others who were on US 31 that night to come forward.

Cynthia mentioned that after their sighting, her father received a call from someone claiming to be an Air Force colonel who reported seeing a UFO, but her father couldn't track this person down for verification. The year 1973 has been documented as particularly active for UFO sightings, earning the nickname "the year of the humanoids" due to numerous reported alien encounters.

Meeting with Dr. Neal

In 1986, Cynthia Vadavas took a significant step toward understanding the puzzling events from her past. After years of troubling uncertainty about what had occurred that October night in 1973, she sought professional help from Dr. Richard Neal. As an obstetrician-gynecologist with expertise in hypnosis, Dr. Neal offered a potential pathway to access the missing memories that had haunted Cynthia for over a decade.

The meeting represented Cynthia's determination to uncover the truth behind her experience. Having relocated to Los Angeles to pursue dance, she remained unable to dismiss the incident that had occurred near Gardendale when she was just 12 years old. Dr. Neal's hypnosis techniques presented a possible means to retrieve the lost time and fill the gaps in her recollection.

Involvement of Bud Hopkins

Cynthia's case drew the attention of prominent ufologist Bud Hopkins, who became actively involved in the investigation. Hopkins, recognized for his extensive work in alien abduction research, recognized the significance of Cynthia's experience and collaborated on the case. His expertise proved valuable as the hypnotic regression sessions revealed increasingly complex details about the encounter.

Hopkins's participation highlighted the unusual aspects of Cynthia's case, particularly the public nature of the incident. Unlike most reported abduction cases where encounters occurred in isolation, this event allegedly took place on a busy highway with multiple witnesses. The involvement of such a respected figure in UFO research lent additional credibility to Cynthia's account.

Hypnotic Regression Details

Under hypnosis, Cynthia provided remarkable details about her experience that night on US Highway 31. She described seeing numerous cars stopped at an intersection, initially assuming there had been an accident. According to her regression testimony, she witnessed a tall, thin humanoid figure walking between vehicles, seemingly putting people into trance-like states as it passed.

Cynthia's hypnotically recovered memories included these key elements:

• Three small whitish beings approached her car and forcibly removed her

• She attempted to resist by gripping the air conditioner vents, which broke

• She was "floated" into a craft with a bright white interior

• Another young girl with "sandy curly hair" was present on a separate table

• A medical examination took place, including an injection in her navel

• She was returned to her mother's car inside a "transparent globe"

The regression session revealed that when the beings placed Cynthia back in the vehicle, the car door slammed on her back—the precise moment where her conscious memory resumed. This detail aligned with her original recollection of suddenly "waking up" in the car with her mother, finding themselves 40 minutes late for dance class.

Hypnosis revealed why a figure would walk openly down the highway. It systematically placed witnesses into trance states, affecting multiple vehicles and drivers simultaneously. This approach differed dramatically from typical cases where entities operate covertly.

Hypnotic recovery suggested the presence of another abductee - a girl Cynthia had never mentioned in her conscious memories. This discovery raised questions about potential patterns in selection criteria for these alleged examinations.

source Things Visible and Invisible https://www.tvi.show/nexus/alabamas-shocking-ufo-abduction-the-1973-vodovoz-encounter

1973 Eupora UFO Case

 There must be someone in the Eupora, Mississippi who can actually just track down if the witnesses are still alive -I'll do the rest!

MUFON/UIfologists as well as local press/media appear totally disinterested.

Encounter in Cehești ( Certesti)

 

Accesări: 4065

During the night of July 8 to 9, 1996, in the center of a village, in Eastern Romania, a police sergeant and a guardian had a close encounter of the III-rd kind. They saw a UFO hovering above the road and three humanoids around it. Some other events seem to be connected with.

 The case was observed in the village Cerţeşti (pronouncedTchertzeshty), district Galati, in South of the Moldavian Region of Romania. Only newspaper and tabloid reporters investigated the CE III in the next days and not UFO "professionals", because of the lack of funds and of appropriate UFO research structures in Romania. The TV producer Mihai Badescu, with a small team, was gone to Certesti, on August 12, 1996, to make a short film about this event, for TVR1, the main Romanian Public TV channel. He invited Calin Turcu and me (both of us having books published in Romanian about the UFO phenomenon) for comments. During that day, we had detailed discussions with the witnesses of this encounter and with other people, including skeptics. The main findings are mentioned bellow.

Officer Mancu

The police sergeant Marian Mancu and Marcel Rusu, voluntary guardian, were patrolling on the main road passing the village Certesti, on July 8 to 9, 1996, at night, in front of the police office. In this place, on both sides, between the road and the sidewalks, there are deep ditches, with small bridges across them. The houses are behind the fences, in the middle of orchards and gardens, except a two-storied apartment house, opposite the police station. The police sergeant lived in one apartment of this building. Around 0.30 AM, Mancu told Rusu that he would go home for ten minutes, to eat something. The entrance is behind the building. The moment the sergeant passed the corner, he heard a whistling sound from the street and sensed a current of air. He turned immediately back, seeing on the road something which "splashed blue and red lights, making a sound like voom-voom".

Rusu


At the first moment the sergeant had the impression that a police car from the district capital Galati arrived in a routine control. Getting closer he realized that the object was hovering half meter above the paving and a small and very strange person is moving around it. He cried "Guard"! As an answer, he observed the horrified guardian, coming half out from the ditch were he was hiding himself, below a bridge. He whispered - "Mister Marian - the Satan!"

Rusu declared later that, immediately after the sergeant disappeared behind the apartment house, "a fluttering from the above appeared..." The neon lighting of the street seemed to change in intensity. The object descended smoothly, without noise, behind him. For a short instant he was convinced too that it was the police car, for a routine control, but, turning, he became frightened when realized that the object had no contact with the ground and that three small human like creatures are moving around it. As he declared "when I saw how they are, their ugliness, I told myself they are not our own folk. I became afraid and I was hiding myself in the ditch... if something happened... because I have never seen such things in my life..."

As both witnesses agreed, the object had the form of a flat hut, 5-6 meters across and 2-2.5 meters high, and was hovering and balancing 0.5 meters above the ground. Around the edge it had a continuous girdle of light "as a rainbow". The colors: red and blue (or green in other declarations) changed from each other and flared. At the bottom of the object was a bright white light. None of the witnesses saw doors, portholes or other details.

After about two minutes, as they estimated, the UFO rose vertically. At that moment its lights became much brighter, but the neon streetlights went off. When the object reached around 30 meters, it changed direction and turned toward East, with a tremendous speed. The neon light went on after not more than thirty seconds.

The guardian Rusu saw better the humanoid creatures. Sergeant Mancu noticed only one and only from behind. Their height was estimated to be around one meter, maybe less ("as a child of six years"). Rusu said he heard some noises made by them, "as the rain in the drain pipe". Both agreed the creatures gave the impression of "abortion" (in the sense of "unfulfilled" as they mentioned later). The visitors had a big head, very elongated behind, and covered with bumps, with no hair, big ears ("as a palm of a man"). Their face was white and they had big eyes. Gray scales with a metallic shining, as the fish scales, covered their body. The belly was relatively big and limp. The arms were "not thicker than two fingers". None of the witnesses remembered the nose, the mouth or shoes. The witnesses could not tell for sure if the creatures were walking or flying above the ground, but accepted as more likely the second possibility. Rusu said they moved, "as they were drunk".

The physical traces were weak. A huge sweet cherry tree nearby had around 15% of its leaves affected, as by an extreme heat, on the side where the object was seen. The damage was visible even after one month, when we were on the place. Some people from the village told us that next morning, after the encounter, many leaves and broken limbs were spread on the road on that place. Some others were convinced that was a result of human activity. No other signs were recorded. Nobody measured the radioactivity or took samples.

Sergeant Mancu declared that, after the object disappeared he had to help Rusu to come out of the ditch. The guardian told him that he was sick and he had to sit on the grass for a while before becoming capable of walking. He remained convinced he was seeing Satan. After about a quarter of an hour a tractor was coming on the street, driven by Nicu Chicos. The two asked him if he had seen something. The tractor driver finally admitted that he and another countryman Emil Bugeac, of the nearby village Carlomanesti, had seen a bright light, with some colored blinking, in the evening before at 10.30 or 11 P.M., three kilometers away from Certesti. But it could be a plane too.

More interesting should be the testimony of the countryman Gheorghe Ghenghea from Certesti. He was watching that night, with his daughter, a song contest on TV. In a certain moment, the image deteriorated, extinguished, restored for a moment, extinguished once again, and after a short while came back without other problems. No other lights were on in the house; so, it could be a short blackout. The witness went out, to ask a neighbor about, but apparently, everybody was sleeping. The color TV appliance was new and he had no problem with it until that moment, or after. The inhabitants told us that some other electrical appliances in the village were disturbed too. We had not the time to verify these allegations.

Another interesting witness was Stefan Dumitru Carje, from the village Cotoroaia, 4 km Northeast from Certesti. He woke up, the same night, because of the barking of dogs, at 1.12 AM (he remembered seeing the watch). The backyard was lighted by "very powerful and extended yellow through red light" coming from the high. Going outside, he was not capable to identify any source. "The sky was red and the ground red... it was so bright you could read a newspaper". He told he was 62, he had three years of army with the air force but it was a light he had never seen. The witness controlled the dependencies. "All the animals were up, but not scared. The birds were not croaking or cackling... Only the dogs were barking". After a while he re‑entered the house. When he was thinking to wake up his wife and two grandsons, to see the phenomenon, "the light became thinner and thinner... easy, easy... maybe it lasted three minutes until that powerful light disappeared and remained the light of the night". He added later: "I saw something as a haze raising up to a certain height and afterwards disappearing slowly in the air".

Cerțești

The witnesses are credible. The police sergeant Marian Mancu (30 years) was, for a while, veterinary technician, before graduating a police school. He is married, with two children and he is healthy and sane. The majority of the village population, including the village mayor Gheorghe Nechifor, considers him a serious person, not capable of lies or hoaxes. Mancu was interested in the historical events of the region. He led an initiative to build a monument for the heroes of the village, from the two world wars. He had a personal library of several hundreds of books, but nothing about UFOs, paranormal or connected issues. The sergeant told me that even he heard about UFOs, he did not believe in them and was not concerned about.

The guardian Maricel Rusu (41 years) graduated six classes, but his education seems lower. He reads little, with difficulty, and only "about some crimes in newspapers". He has never heard almost anything before about the UFO phenomenon. Maricel Rusu is Orthodox Christian but not bigot or even practicing. This explains his first hypothesis, that he met Satan and the fright after this finding. He has no recorded psychic disorders, and he served in the army as sapper. The villagers did not remember he was lying in the past. Even if he drinks sometimes, he has never been seen drunk. Before the close encounter he had his arm badly injured by a horse and he was following a treatment with antibiotics, so he was restrained to drink alcohol.

It is unlikely the witnesses could invent all the very peculiar details and to expose them in such a highly natural and convincing manner. It is also unlikely that it could be a delusion staged by someone else. Unfortunately we had not other means to certify this impression, e.g. psychological tests, or lie detector, but we did not discover anybody with any motivation to invent such a story.

Not all the villagers gave credit to the witnesses. A mathematics teacher contests the story telling she was awake in this period of time, living in the same apartment house as the sergeant, but she heard and saw nothing. A person said that his "Mercedes" was on the street, and it was confused with a UFO. Another person objected that the place was too narrow for landing, because of the telephone or electrical wires on both sides of the road. This objection was rejected, the distance between the wires being comfortably wider than the dimensions estimated for this UFO. More interesting, the "debunkers" were mainly people that had legal problems with the local police, or people related to them.

On the above premises, we consider that the Certesti case could be qualified as a CE III. But was it more than that? Maybe it was a CE IV; in other terms, was it abduction? A first argument is that, in the following days, sergeant Mancu felt sick and powerless; he supposed he was irradiated. The guardian Rusu had repeated nightmares. As he declares: " I was dreaming on the following days... about how I was hiding myself in the ditch... then I woke up frightened... because they were so ugly".

I questioned both of them about a possible "missing time" period. None of them had such an impression. But when I tried to establish more precisely the time marks, I found that none of them had a watch. The sergeant said "I had not my watch with me... because the bracelet was torn". Rusu had no watch at all.

Trying to establish the succession of the events, we found strange discontinuities. No one of the witnesses remembered to see the humanoids descending from the UFO or reentering. More than that, the witnesses could not explain how the visitors did that, because no doors or entrances were visible. Maricel Rusu declared "I did not see which way they descended... They were already turning around". The situation was the same when the UFO was flying up - the creatures simply were no more there, and nobody saw them going up in the object. The same witness declared: "they disappeared, but I didn’t take notice what way they disappeared... I don't know where they entered and I did not see them entering... maybe behind..." Sergeant Mancu recognized also that he could not explain how the little men disappeared. His impression was that he observed the small creature only for four-five seconds...

In the literature there are many cases when the witnesses considered they had a CE III only for several seconds or minutes, but after some complementary procedures, for example hypnotic regression, they discover that it was a much longer story and a CE IV. Therefore, we agreed, it would be interesting to use this technique, or something similar, in this case too. Unfortunately, in Romania we face a lack of professionals practicing hypnotic regression or willing to apply it in such situations. Even the traveling expenses to arrange sessions constitute a problem.

Another curiosity discovered in our visit was that the villagers of Certesti told us about several other very interesting and quite typical UFO observations, even close encounters, in the last years. They have never been reported. They would have remained completely unknown if the main event had not happened. I wonder about how many similar situations are in the villages of Romania and of many other countries too.

As a peculiar but not unique sequel, we can mention that, after two years, sergeant Mancu was fired from the police, most probable because he tried to be "hypercorrect" in several cases, even against his chiefs. One argument used was that Mancu is "that guy who sees UFOs"

Dan D. Farcas

https://asfanufo.ro/index.php/romanian-cases/187-a-close-encounter-of-the-third-kind-in-romania

(Previously published in EJUFOAS, The European Journal of UFO and Abduction Studies, September 2001)

Looks as though another case will be lost

 Well I contact two local newspapers/media outlets in the area but despite a second polite email...nothing.

It really looks as though the 1973 Euopra, Mississippi incident is a case we have lost.

Anyone with UFO investigator contacts in Mississippi -oh, as always MUFON Mississippi has also refused to respond.

"Two or three people stopped..."

 "Two or three people on a quiet country road at night stop their cars and get out to observe maneuvering very bright object in the sky. Why were they not abducted?"

Well, they probably saw UNP -natural light phenomena that we know as much about as we do ball lightning!  These objects are bright and very impressive and can vary in size but, despite people believing they must be under intelligent control they are not.

Also, if we accept that on board experiences do take place, then we have to admit that we have no idea what criteria are involved or what "aliens" think. The people in those cars that stopped might not suit the criteria or anyone aboard said objects might not be involved in interactions.

Once a straight forward report gets to Ufologists they can put any slant on it they want and in more than one case I have heard people involved say "But I never claimed that!"

I am posting this because I am *****

 

I am posting this around as I am somewhat unhappy at the revenue I am losing from books.]

I use a US based print on demand company (UK is so backward it does not have PODs) and they get a cut of a sale for simply storing a PDF. The printers get their money, rightly. And any sales money is low BUT I can get taxed by the IRS and the POD only pays me when the exchange rate is in its ($) favour.,

I have lost money on my CE3K books. I saw each one appear and US next to it but my percentage 0000. This has happened before and the POD always sends you in circles with silly excuses.

I know someone in the US who has helped out with non payment and other issues with UIS companies re my other work. He's ex-IRS and I've done him a few favours so I asked if he could look into these printed books for which I get nothing?

Today he got back to me. "The "US" on the data sheet you see is not for a US sale as such. It means that the copies were requested by the US Government. I checked and have found that your books -total four sets of all the books since 2024- were delivered to the United States Department of Defense (pre title change). That means a total block on finding out who exactly ordered them. Sorry"

I say no more.

July 1965 Milnthorpe Cumbria

Also reported by John Hanson in Haunted Skies

July 1965 Milnthorpe Cumbria

David Sankey, a BUFORA investigator.

In July 1965, late at night couple and their baby son were making an overnight journey when they pulled over for a cigarette break at a rest area near Milnthorpe, Cumbria.

It was during this break in their journey that the couple noticed behind a nearby dry-stone wall, an intense red light which appeared lens or domed shaped. Within this light were seen three small creatures which seemed to be giving off a slight green luminescence. The entities were described as having large, round staring eyes and a long nose that looked like a "small elephant trunk" with a mouth that appeared as just a slit. Their heads were large and almost a turnip shape and their bodies were round with hands with digits that were not seen clearly. No definite muscle tone or bone structure was seen, and they did not appear to be wearing any clothing. Two of the three entities had their arms held out in front of them as though gesturing.

The entities appeared to be some 15 feet from the car and in front of the wall when the object's brilliance was noticed. It was reported that the couple became frightened and drove off without seeing the entities depart. They later felt silly for reacting in a frightened manner as they had gotten the impression that the entities had meant no harm.

That, sadly, is it. There was no accompanying illustration of the entities that had been shown to the witnesses and approved and none of the object seen. We do not even know where they stopped; Milnthorpe is a village in hilly country and there is the B5282 road and A5 running around it. If this had happened in France during 1965 it would probably have led to a lengthy report

Anything New...

 will be posted on the Face Book group

https://www.facebook.com/groups/2463400933890105

Done.

 I am all spent.  Thousands of views but no book sales. No feed back.  Perhaps joining the UFO grifters would have been best.

Enjoy what is on site.

35 Planets Where We Might Find Alien Life?

 

A diagram depicting habitable zone boundaries across star type with rocky exoplanets from Bohl et al. (2026). The boundaries of the habitable zone shift based on star colour, since different wavelengths of light will heat a planet's atmosphere differently.   Credit Gillis Lowry / Pablo Carlos Budassi Licence type Attribution (CC BY 4.0)

The best places to look for alien life: Scientists identify 45 Earth-like worlds to explore for a 'Project Hail Mary' | The Royal Astronomical Society

If we're to find extraterrestrial life in the universe, astronomers have pinpointed the best places to look for it.

They have identified just under 50 rocky worlds most likely to be habitable out of the more than 6,000 exoplanets discovered so far.

Their research, published today in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, would be useful in a scenario portrayed in the newly-released Hollywood blockbuster Project Hail Mary, which sees Ryan Gosling's character having to travel to an exoplanet system in search of a way to save Earth.

On the way he encounters an alien lifeform named Rocky and the fictional extraterrestrial micro-organisms Astrophage and Taumoeba.

Professor Lisa Kaltenegger, director of the Carl Sagan Institute at Cornell University, and a team of undergraduate students used new data from the European Space Agency's Gaia mission and the NASA Exoplanet Archive to identify planets in the so-called habitable zone.

This is an area not too close to a host star that it’s too hot, and not too far away that it’s too cold. lt also means that, like Earth, a planet is much more likely to have water on its surface – which is a key ingredient for life.

The paper, titled 'Probing the limits of habitability: a catalogue of rocky exoplanets in the habitable zone', also shortlisted the worlds that receive the most similar energy from their star compared to what Earth gets from our Sun.

"As Project Hail Mary so beautifully illustrates, life might be much more versatile than we currently imagine, so figuring out which of the 6,000 known exoplanets would be most likely to host extraterrestrials such as Astrophage and Taumoeba – or Rocky – could prove critical, and not just to Ryan Gosling," Professor Kaltenegger said.

"Our paper reveals where you should travel to find life if we ever built a 'Hail Mary' spacecraft."

The researchers pinpointed 45 rocky worlds that may support life in the habitable zone, and another 24 in a narrower 3D habitable zone that makes a more conservative assumption of how much heat a planet can take before it loses its habitability.

They include some famous exoplanets, including Proxima Centauri b, TRAPPIST-1f and Kepler 186f, as well as others that are not as well known, such as TOI-715 b.

The most interesting planets of those listed, according to the authors, are TRAPPIST-1 d, e, f and g, which are 40 light-years from Earth, as well as LHS 1140 b, which is 48 light-years away. Whether these planets could have liquid water depends in part if they can hold an atmosphere. 

The worlds that get light from their stars most similar to what modern Earth receives from the Sun are the transiting planets TRAPPIST-1 e, TOI-715 b, Kepler-1652 b, Kepler-442 b, Kepler-1544 b and the planets Proxima Centauri b, GJ 1061 d, GJ 1002 b, and Wolf 1069 b, which make their stars wobble.

The authors also hope the planets they have identified near the edges of the habitable zone will shed light on exactly where habitability ends and if scientists' theories about those limits are correct. While the idea of the habitable zone has been developed since the 1970s, new observations will be critical in establishing whether certain assumptions need adapting, Professor Kaltenegger said.

In addition, exoplanets with unusual elliptical orbits around their star can trace the importance of a changing amount of heat hitting a world and help answer the question of whether a planet needs to stay in the habitable zone or can cross in and out of it and still remain habitable.

The transiting planets that can test the limit of habitability on the inner edge are K2-239 d, TOI-700e, K2-3d – as well as the planets Wolf 1061c and GJ 1061c, which make their stars wobble. Trappist-1g and Kepler-441b and GJ 102 can probe the outer edge of habitability where it gets extremely cold, the researchers say.

"While it's hard to say what makes something more likely to have life, identifying where to look is the first key step – so the goal of our project was to say 'here are the best targets for observation'," said Gillis Lowry, now a graduate student at San Francisco State University.

Fellow researcher Lucas Lawrence, now a graduate student at the University of Padua in Italy, said: "We wanted to create something that will enable other scientists to search effectively and we kept discovering new things about these worlds we wanted to investigate further."

Co-author Abigail Bohl, of Cornell University, added: "We know Earth is habitable, while Venus and Mars are not. We can use our Solar System as a reference to search for exoplanets that receive stellar energy between what Venus and Mars get.

"Observing these planets can help us understand when habitability is lost, how much energy is too much, and which planets remain habitable – or maybe never were.

"The same idea applies to eccentric planets: how much orbital eccentricity can a planet have while still holding onto its surface water and habitable conditions?

"We identified planets at the inner and outer edges of the habitable zone, as well as those with the highest eccentricities, to test our understanding of what it takes for a planet to be and remain habitable. We also identified the targets that are most observable with the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and other telescopes."

The students also earmarked the best planets to observe with different techniques, to give scientists the best odds of finding signs of life if they exist on these worlds.

The list they've created will guide astronomers studying the night sky with JWST, the upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (set to launch in 2027), the Extremely Large Telescope (set to see first light in 2029), the Habitable Worlds Observatory (expected to launch in the 2040s) and the proposed Large Interferometer For Exoplanets (LIFE) project.

Observing these small exoplanets is the only way to confirm if they have atmospheres, and whether astronomers need to refine their ideas of what limits the habitable zone, Lowry said.

She added that she's already been using the list to take an early look at the 10 planets that receive very similar radiation to Earth, identifying two that are close enough to study with current or upcoming telescopes: TRAPPIST-1 e and TOI-715 b.

The TRAPPIST-1 planetary system is a main focus of observation with the JWST telescope, a programme led by Nikole Lewis, associate professor of astronomy at Cornell. Trappist-1 and TOI-715 b are both small red stars, making it easier to see the small, Earth-sized planets orbiting around them.