(Learn more about habitable-zone planets in " Kepler Telescope Discovers Most Earth-Like Planet Yet.")Īt least two of those planets, Kepler 438-b and Kepler 442-b, are likely to be rocky, like Earth. This is the region where temperatures are just right for supporting liquid water on the planet's surface. Depending which calculations scientists use, at least three of the planets-and perhaps all eight-are in the habitable zones of their parent stars. Kepler's eight newly confirmed planets are all relatively small, and they all orbit stars that are smaller and cooler than the sun. We are now closer than we have ever been to finding a twin for Earth around a star," says Fergal Mullally of the SETI Institute and NASA's Ames Research Center. "These candidates represent the closest analogues to the Earth-sun system found to date, and this is what Kepler has been looking for. But hiding in the wings, among a group of 554 newly announced planet candidates, is an even more tantalizing set of planets. Those eight new worlds are each less than 2.7 times the size of Earth, astronomers reported at the American Astronomical Society's annual winter meeting. Eight new worlds beyond our solar system, announced Tuesday, boost the number of Kepler's confirmed planets to 1,004 (if you're keeping count), including two of the most Earthlike planets discovered so far. SEATTLE-NASA's venerable planet-hunter, the Kepler spacecraft, has shaken its one-thousandth planet from the sky.
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