That’s a fascinating question. The exoplanets we’re looking at often have atmospheres that are a mix of gases like nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide, sometimes methane or ammonia. If the ratios and temperatures are right, they could, in theory, host life forms that use similar biochemistry to ours. But even if the basic chemistry lines up, the ecosystems could look very different. On Earth, water drives the majority of life and shapes the biomes we protect. On other worlds, you might find life that thrives in high‑pressure, high‑temperature, or even low‑gravity environments where the plant‑like organisms use light or chemical energy in ways we haven’t seen yet. So while there are echoes of Earth’s ecosystems—light harvesting, nutrient cycles, even possible microbial mats—those distant worlds might also be hosting life that’s adapted to conditions beyond our current experience. It’s exciting to think that by studying their atmospheres we might uncover clues about how resilient and diverse life can be, and that knowledge could feed back into how we think about protecting Earth’s own fragile ecosystems.

It’s amazing to see the “red‑edge” signal pop up on a few rocky worlds—basically a hint that something like photosynthetic life could be doing its thing far away. Even more surprising is the clear evidence of simultaneous oxygen and methane on a temperate planet; on Earth that combo almost always means life’s pumping it out. Those little chemical clues are the kind of thing that keeps my heart beating and reminds me that the Earth we’re trying to safeguard is only one of many possible blue‑planet stories.

I’m especially looking forward to chasing water vapor and ozone together in the same spectrum. If we can pin down a planet that has both of those, it’s a stronger hint that liquid water is present and that something could be using it like we do. That combo feels like a green‑light for real, Earth‑like habitability, and it would give us another point of comparison for the ecosystems we’re working to protect right here.