NASA Finds 7 New Earth-Sized Planets
The quest for life exterior Planet Earth simply got a lot more interesting.
NASA on Midweek revealed information technology has discovered a "treasure trove" of World-sized planets. Dubbed TRAPPIST-1, the system consists of seven Earth-sized planets orbiting around a single, nearby star. Three of these planets are located in what NASA calls the "habitable zone," pregnant the surface area around the parent star where a rocky planet is most likely to have water.
While NASA has identified Earth-like planets earlier, this discovery sets a new record for the largest number of habitable-zone planets plant around a single star outside our solar arrangement. The space agency said all seven planets in TRAPPIST-ane could accept liquid water under the right atmospheric conditions, but the iii in the habitable zone are well-nigh promising.
"This discovery could exist a significant piece in the puzzle of finding habitable environments, places that are conducive to life," Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of NASA'due south Science Mission Directorate in Washington, said in a statement. "Answering the question 'are nosotros alone' is a top science priority and finding so many planets like these for the first time in the habitable zone is a remarkable pace forwards toward that goal."
The organisation of planets is 40 lite-years abroad from World, or about 325 trillion miles, which is "relatively shut" in the grand scheme of things, NASA said. Since they're located outside our solar organization, they're technically exoplanets.
Using the Transiting Planets and Planetesimals Small Telescope (TRAPPIST), researchers in Chile previously discovered and appear iii planets in the organization. NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope confirmed the being of two of these planets and discovered v additional ones.
NASA said all the TRAPPIST-i planets are likely rocky, but farther observations are needed to determine whether they have any liquid water on their surfaces. The system's star is much smaller than Earth's sun, significant liquid water could possibly survive on planets orbiting very close to it. All vii of the TRAPPIST-i planets are closer to their star than Mercury is to our sun.
"The planets too are very close to each other," NASA said. "If a person was standing on one of the planet's surface, they could gaze up and potentially see geological features or clouds of neighboring worlds, which would sometimes appear larger than the moon in Earth's sky."
The planets may besides be "tidally locked" to their star, the agency added, meaning the same side of the planet is always facing the star. That side would exist perpetually day, while the side facing abroad from the star would exist night all the fourth dimension. "This could mean they accept atmospheric condition patterns totally dissimilar those on Earth, such every bit strong winds blowing from the day side to the night side, and extreme temperature changes," NASA said.
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