Astronomers have found a potentially habitable super-Earth planet (relatively) nearby, using NASA's TESS satellite.
While we await the launch of the game-changing James Webb Space Telescope, the space agency’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite is doing a nifty job of detecting the nearest exoplanets.
“This is exciting, as this is humanity’s first nearby super-Earth that could harbor life – uncovered with help from TESS, our small, mighty mission with a huge reach,” said Kaltenegger, associate professor of astronomy, director of Cornell’s Carl Sagan Institute and a member of the TESS science team, Only 31 light-years away from Earth, the exoplanet GJ 357 d catches light from its host star GJ 357, in this artistic rendering.
“GJ 357 d is located within the outer edge of its star’s habitable zone, where it receives about the same amount of stellar energy from its star as Mars does from the Sun,” said co-author Diana Kossakowski at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany, . “If the planet has a dense atmosphere, which will take future studies to determine, it could trap enough heat to warm the planet and allow liquid water on its surface.
Future telescopes like James Webb will help astronomers to peer more closely at the system and in the meantime, scientists will work on establishing just what signs of life to search for.
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