Habitable zones around low mass stars and the search for extraterrestrial life

Habitable planets are likely to exist around stars not too different from the Sun if current theories about terrestrial climate evolution are correct. Some of these planets may have evolved life, and some of the inhabited planets may have evolved O-2-rich atmospheres. Such atmospheres could be detected spectroscopically on planets around nearby stars using a space-based interferometer to search for the 9.6 mu m band of O-3. Planets with O-2-rich atmospheres that lie within the habitable zone around their parent star are, in all probability, inhabited.