Astronomers have identified a new Earth-sized planet orbiting a sun-like star about 146 light-years from Earth, raising fresh interest in nearby worlds that could support life, according to a recent study.
The candidate, known as HD 137010 b, was detected using data from NASA’s Kepler space telescope’s K2 mission collected in 2017 and analyzed by an international team led by University of Southern Queensland (USQ) researcher Alexander Venner.
Their findings were published on Tuesday in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
The planet is estimated to be about 6% larger than Earth and follows a roughly 355-day orbit, according to the study.
Researchers said it has "about a 50% chance of residing in the habitable zone” of its star, though its surface temperature may be closer to Mars and potentially below minus 94 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 70 degrees Celsius).
"What’s very exciting about this particular Earth-sized planet is that its star is only (about) 150 light-years away from our solar system,” said co-author Chelsea Huang of USQ, adding that its relative proximity makes it a promising target for future telescopes.
"The next best planet around a sun-like star, in a habitable zone, [Kepler-186f] is about four times farther away and 20 times fainter,” she said.
The faint signal revealing the planet was first flagged by citizen scientists, including lead author Venner, who said: "I contributed to this citizen science project called Planet Hunters back when I was in secondary school, and it was a big part of how I got into research.”
"Future space missions designed to directly image Earth-like planets, like the NASA Habitable Worlds Observatory, may also be capable of capturing images of HD 137010 b,” he added.
