Posted on 08/23/2016 6:24:47 AM PDT by Red Badger
Astronomers are preparing to announce the discovery of a potentially habitable second Earth orbiting a nearby star, it has been claimed.
Last month, sources leaked news that the European Southern Observatory (ESO) had spotted an alien world orbiting Proxima Centauri, our closest stellar neighbour.
An anonymous source from the ESO told German publication Der Spiegel the discovery is the closest habitable planet to Earth, which means we could reach it within our lifetime.
But the astonishing finding was not officially announced, sparking furious speculation that the second Earth has deliberately been kept a secret.
Now the ESO is set to finally reveal details of the planet at a press conference tomorrow and astronomers are also likely to discuss whether it has the potential to support life.
“The still nameless planet is believed to be Earth-like and orbits at a distance to Proxima Centauri that could allow it to have liquid water on its surface — an important requirement for the emergence of life,” the source said.
“Never before have scientists discovered a second Earth that is so close by.”
Since its launch in 2009, NASA’s planet finding Kepler Spacecraft has discovered more than 4000 exoplanet candidates.
Of these, there have been 216 Earth-like located within the Goldilocks Zone — the region around a star in which the surface temperature of an orbiting planet might support water.
The problem is that while most of these Earth-like planets are habitable, they are located thousands of light years away, which means they are out of our reach.
Astronomers from the observatory had previously claimed to have found the then-closest exoplanet to Earth in 2012, although subsequent analysis cast doubt on its existence.
Despite this misstep, the unnamed source claim this latest discovery is authentic and the result of intensive work.
“Finding small celestial bodies is a lot of hard work,” the source said. “We were moving at the technically feasible limit of measurement.”
If the findings are correct, Russian billionaire Yuri Milner’s search for intelligent life could focus on heading to the planet.
As part of Milner’s plans, Project Starshot intends to send a laser-sail driven-nanocraft to Alpha Centauri — the closest star system to the Solar System — in the coming years.
With the craft able to travel up to 20 per cent of the speed of light, if Project Starshot was to rethink its objective, it would be able to reach the Earth-like planet orbiting Proxima Centauri in less than 20 years.
However, mastermind of Project Starshot Professor Phillip Lubin said the focus will likely stay on Alpha Centauri.
“The discovery of possible planet around Proxima Centauri is very exciting. It makes the case of visiting nearby stellar systems even more compelling, though we know there are many exoplanets around other nearby stars and it is very likely that the Alpha Centauri system will also have planets,” he told Universe Today.
The European Southern Observatory are expected to officially announce the finding at the end of August.
Wow. 18 posts and nobody said anything about Uranus.
The fastest-ever man-made object reached a peak speed of 165,000 mph. It could reach our new home planet in just 4,000 years.
Space is big. Sun readers are stupid.
Ah, the Weekly World News. Memories. Good times.
We have a lot of things to be embarrassed about, like Leave It to Beaver and Petticoat Junction, and That Girl, to name a few.
The only reason the power that be would cover up the existence of aliens and other worlds would be that they don;t want us to leave so they can control us...
They don’t want a repeat of events which would lead to an “America in Space” revolting against the monarchy again....
Unless and until we achieve light speed we are not going anywhere any time soon. Not today and not tomorrow. These are the facts.
Not only that but 27 posts and no Ancient Aliens guy
LOL.
Proxima Centari is a red dwarf star in a TRI-nary system, the other two stars are so far away from Proxima that they would be further than neptune, on said planet the two stars would be just like two bright stars in our night sky.
The planet is supposedly around Proxima Centari and that star orbits around A and B at a distance far greater than Neptune's distance from the sun.
Gore is from Uranus.
If they're intelligent SIGN ME UP TO GO!!
I want the hell off this planet asap --- too many stupid people on it!
I believe this is old news, read something posted on FR either last week or two weeks ago.
Or wiping out the Klingons around it.
I think I’ll have a better chance of knowing what’s on that planet if I follow my religious faith, and after I die and go to heaven, I’ll ask the creator for a trip around the universe.
And have the universe taken over by Islam? - I think not.
Oh, I agree. But the obstacles to overcome make transoceanic travel by sail look like a stroll around the block on a sunny day. Most SciFi is repackaged western saga, that either ignore Physics or assume somebody some day is going to upend Einstein and Newton.
At no point in history has any government ever wanted its people to be defenseless for any good reason ~ nully's son
Nut-job Conspiracy Theory Ping!
To get onto The Nut-job Conspiracy Theory Ping List you must threaten to report me to the Mods if I don't add you to the list...
No. No one does.
I see he’s with Hillary.......(forehead)..............
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