Planet Found in Habitable Zone Around Nearest Star

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Source:  European Southern Observatory eso1629 — Science Release

Excerpt: Astronomers using ESO telescopes and other facilities have found clear evidence of a planet orbiting the closest star to Earth, [a red dwarf star] Proxima Centauri [just over four light-years from the Solar System]. The long-sought world, designated Proxima b, orbits its cool red parent star every 11 days and has a temperature suitable for liquid water to exist on its surface. This rocky world is a little more massive than the Earth and is the closest exoplanet to us — and it may also be the closest possible abode for life outside the Solar System. A paper describing this milestone finding was published in the journal Nature on 25 August 2016.

...Proxima Centauri ...cool star in the constellation of Centaurus is too faint to be seen with the unaided eye and lies near to the much brighter pair of stars known as Alpha Centauri AB.

Although Proxima b orbits much closer to its star than Mercury does to the Sun in the Solar System, the star itself is far fainter than the Sun. As a result Proxima b lies well within the habitable zone around the star and has an estimated surface temperature that would allow the presence of liquid water. Despite the temperate orbit of Proxima b, the conditions on the surface may be strongly affected by the ultraviolet and X-ray flares from the star — far more intense than the Earth experiences from the Sun....

See also


https://www.eso.org/public/news/eso1629/?lang

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