Add your Article
- Chemistry and Materials
- Meteorites may have sparked life on Earth
- Cold, colder and coldest ice
- Silk’s superpowers
- E Learning Jamaica
- Results of GSAT are in schools this week
- E Learning in Jamaica WIN PRIZES and try our Fun Animated Games
- 2014 GSAT Results for Jamaican Kids
- Food and Nutrition
- How Super Are Superfruits?
- The Color of Health
- In Search of the Perfect French Fry
- GSAT Exam Preparation Jamaica
- 2014 GSAT Results for Jamaican Kids
- Results of GSAT are in schools this week
- How are students placed after passing the GSAT exam
- GSAT Exams Jamaica Scholarships
- GSAT Exam Preparation
- Results of GSAT are in schools this week
- GSAT stars reap scholarship glory
- GSAT Mathematics
- It's a Math World for Animals
- GSAT Practice Papers | GSAT Mathematics | Maths
- A Sweet Advance in Candy Packing
Cousin Earth
Published: 07/06/2010
As their search continues, astronomers are finding more and more planets orbiting nearby stars. This time, they've detected a solid planet that's just 15 light-years from Earth. Many details about the planet remain unknown because the astronomers didn't see it directly. Instead, they were able to detect how the planet's gravity makes its star wobble a little bit. Out of 156 planets discovered so far in other solar systems, the new extrasolar planet is the smallest one yet found. It's about 7.5 times heavier than Earth. Along with two, much bigger planets, the new world orbits a star called Gliese 876. The planet takes just 1.9 days to complete an orbit around Gliese 876. So, its year is much, much shorter than ours. It's so close to its star that its surface is hot enough to roast a chicken. Most extrasolar planets that have been found so far are big balls of gas, like Jupiter and Saturn. Because the planet's mass is low, it probably couldn't hold onto much gas. So, scientists suspect that it's rocky. "This could be the first [known] rocky planet around any normal star other than the sun," says team member Jack Lissauer of NASA's Ames Research Center in Mountain View, Calif. Scientists are still trying to figure out how rocky planets might form so close to their stars. Whatever the answer, the new discovery gives researchers confidence that they will one day find even closer cousins to Earth somewhere in the universe. And, on a planet resembling Earth, they might also discover traces of life as we know it.—E. Sohn
Cousin Earth
