exoExplorer is a free Windows application being developed by planetarybiology.com. It helps astronomers, astrobiologists and astronomy enthusiasts to visualize exoplanet environments. At this writing (06-09-2009), the number of exoplanets is 349.

Visualizing hundreds of exoplanet environments with nothing more than a large table of data is laborious, unsatisfying and clearly uninspiring. By providing several 3-D screens, exoExplorer lets users immerse themselves in the exoplanet’s environment and see what it might be like to be on this planet or a moon orbiting nearby. exoExplorer lets you walk around, look around, drive around and fly around these mysterious new worlds.

As nearly all known exoplanets probably are large gas planets, and as such, have no well-defined atmosphere-rock interface, there is nowhere to stand. Users may fly around in the atmosphere of the exoplanet, but for walking and driving, users are given the option of experiencing the space from the vantage point of a hypothetical moon in orbit around the exoplanet.

exoExplorer lets users adjust many environmental settings. Users may choose between atmospheres of different densities and chemical composition, terrains of different shapes and textures, moon present or not, moon tidally locked or not, and different types of surface vehicles.

Users may create a list of destinations (voyage legs) in a voyage itinerary and custom configure each voyage leg by adjusting the environmental settings mentioned above. Users may save and load voyages as exoExplorer documents. exoExplorer includes full data undo-redo.

exoExplorer uses the latest Microsoft MFC user interface with highly flexible and configurable windows. In addition, exoExplorer takes full advantage of the Ogre 3D graphics engine for visual scenes, Caelum for dynamic skies, Newton Game Dynamics for physics and collision detection, and Object-oriented Input System (OIS) for user input.

Beta version 0.8.3 now available for download.

What is planetary biology and how does this science fit into the overall thinking about life on worlds – including Earth and others?

Planetary biology is a whole world systems science. That is, the fundamental operational unit is the whole planet. The planetary biology perspective supports our efforts to understand how the activities of life (enterprising objects*) interact with and influence the operations and characteristics of the whole planet. For example, how can the collective activities of enterprising objects influence a planet's atmosphere?

Planetary biology is an integrated science. The diagram at left shows the arrangement of various scientific disciplines that are useful in planetary biology. Out of necessity, it uses Earth as the basic organizational template.

Given that life on Earth churns the crustal surface, the oceans and the atmosphere in a variety of chemical ways, and produces many interesting chemical results, this diagram prominently includes chemistry-related disciplines. We see on our planet that the chemistry of life (biochemistry) can powerfully exploit the chemistry of the physical planet (geochemistry) to produce remarkable environmental outcomes (biogeochemistry).

Planetary biology incorporates ecological principles along with biogeochemistry in an effort to understand the sensible organizational arrangements and dynamics of a planet's enterprising occupants. Ultimately, this synthesis provides an analytical framework that is useful for understanding the collective, long-term consequences of a world’s global biogeochemical activities. This is the science of planetary biology.

The continuing discoveries of exoplanets (exoplanet astronomy) provide exciting new platforms upon which to contemplate possibilities for life elsewhere in the galaxy. The application of the principles of planetary biology onto these new worlds yields the hopeful science of astrobiology.