SC45302729d

SC45302729d is the name of the exoplanet to which The Ingenuity is currently headed. SC45302729d is colloquially known as "The exoplanet" on board the ship.

Naming
“SC” stands for Stellar Catalogue, and “d” indicates it is the fourth planet from its sun. SC45302729d is the name given to the planet by the Unda Astronomical Society. There is currently an active poll among the inhabitants of the Ingenuity to give the exoplanet a more memorable name.

Known Data
SC45302729d is about 1.2 Unda masses and orbits a K-type dwarf star (slightly smaller and cooler than Unda's Sun) at a distance of 0.72 AU. This puts it squarely in its system’s habitable zone, the zone in which liquid water can exist on the surface of the planet. The Exoplanet transits its star (as visible from the line of sight of Unda and the ship), and therefore spectra of the star it orbits contain details about the elemental composition of the atmosphere if taken during the transit. That is, some light from the star passes through the Exoplanet’s atmosphere before reaching the observer. Spectra have shown that the atmosphere is a breathable mixture containing oxygen and nitrogen, and traces of water, indicating large quantities of liquid water are present on the surface.

In the year 500, the IUSC sent three unmanned flyby spacecraft into deep space to visit the systems of known exoplanets. One of the craft went to the SC45302729 system, completing a single pass flyby of SC45302729d and capturing many images of the planetary surface. This information was sent back to Unda, and the scientists on the Exoplanet Transition Team on the Ingenuity have studied these images in the process of planning our settlement. It is now know that the Exoplanet has a biosphere, as infrared imagery reveals copious plant life, and that the Exoplanet has much smaller seas than Unda, with much more land area. The images did not reveal any sign of synthetic structures on the Exoplanet's surface.

Mavat Solborne, an astronomer on the Ingenuity, has been sending radio signals into space towards known exoplanet systems (including SC45302729) for decades, but has not received any response. While the Ingenuity has sent radio signals in many different frequencies to the Exoplanet, and has kept a radio telescope pointed at it since the Final Transmission, we have no signs of any intelligent signals coming from the planet, making an underground civilization unlikely. The consensus of the ETT is that the Exoplanet contains a biosphere, but no intelligent life.