New research using the powerful JWST telescope has identified a planet 41 light-years away which may have an atmosphere. The planet is within the “habitable zone”, the region around a star where temperatures make it possible for liquid water to exist on the surface of a rocky world. This is important because water is a … Read more
As many as 200 worlds beyond our solar system discovered by astronomers may be larger than estimated, which could influence the search for extraterrestrial life. That’s the theory of a team of researchers who looked at hundreds of extrasolar planets, or exoplanets, observed by NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). TESS hunts exoplanets by catching … Read more
Astronomers have captured the first evidence of a “planet with a death wish” — an alien world that’s orbiting so close to its star and so fast that it’s causing the star to cook it to death with stellar explosions. The planet, called HIP 67522 b, is a wispy, Jupiter-size planet bound on a tight, … Read more
The Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), currently under construction in northern Chile, will give us a better view of the Milky Way than any ground-based telescope before it. It’s difficult to overstate how transformative it will be. The ELT’s primary mirror array will have an effective diameter of 39 meters. It will gather more light than … Read more
A quartet of Earth-like worlds, each about 20% to 30% the size of our planet, circle one of our closest stellar neighbors, a new study reveals. The rocky alien worlds are close enough that future generations of humans may be able to visit them with futuristic rocket propulsion technology. However, it is unlikely that we … Read more
The innermost Earth-like planet in the famous TRAPPIST-1 system might be capable of supporting a thick atmosphere after all, according to new research. Since the system of seven tightly-packed, Earth-sized worlds was discovered in 2017, huddled in remarkable harmony just 40 light-years from Earth, astronomers have tried to determine whether any support atmosphere, which is … Read more
Far beyond the eight familiar planets in our solar system, countless bizarre and extreme worlds await discovery — and some have already been found. Thanks to rapidly advancing telescope technology, astronomers have detected more than 5,600 planets outside our solar system. These exoplanets, as scientists call them, are worlds of lava, and worlds of water. They’re worlds … Read more
A planet beyond the solar system that has been compared to Spock’s homeworld Vulcan in the Star Trek franchise may have been nothing more than an illusion caused by a jittery star. The extrasolar planet or “exoplanet” (a term for a planet outside of our solar system) was proposed to orbit a star called 40 … Read more
Astronomers have discovered a remarkable star system with six planets unlike any in our solar system. According to new research, all six planets orbit the same star in resonance with each other, following an unwavering rhythm that has lasted billions of years. Because of this peculiar resonance, the outermost planet in the system completes one … Read more
Scientists studying a distant “hell planet” where clouds rain lava, the oceans are molten and the core is filled with diamonds have found that the nightmarish planet wasn’t always so bad; but it became infernally hot after being yanked closer to its sun. The planet, classified as 55 Cancri e, is nicknamed “Janssen” after Zacharias … Read more
