Previous Year Question
The term ‘Goldilocks Zone’ is often seen in the news in the context of:
Correct Answer: C
Detailed Solution
The Goldilocks Zone is formally known as the circumstellar habitable zone. It is the range of distance around a star within which liquid water could exist on the surface of an orbiting planet, provided that the planet has a suitable atmosphere.
A planet in this region is neither so close to its star that surface water would boil away nor so far from it that the water would remain completely frozen. Its conditions are therefore described as “not too hot, not too cold, but just right.”
Being situated in the Goldilocks Zone does not prove that a planet supports life. Habitability also depends on the planet’s atmosphere, pressure, chemical composition, magnetic field, exposure to stellar radiation and actual availability of water. Nevertheless, the Goldilocks Zone is an important initial criterion in the search for Earth-like and potentially habitable exoplanets.
Option (a) is incorrect: It does not refer to the limits of a habitable region above Earth’s surface.
Option (b) is incorrect: Shale gas is natural gas found within sedimentary rocks and is unrelated to the Goldilocks Zone.
Option (d) is incorrect: The term is not associated with the search for meteorites containing valuable metals.
Therefore, the Goldilocks Zone is discussed in the context of the search for Earth-like planets in outer space.