ross 508 b - the super earth 37 light years away from us

An Earth-like planet has been found near the habitability zone of a red dwarf star only 37 light years from Earth! Red dwarfs are the coolest and most common stars found on the main sequence (it is estimated that 20-30% of main sequence stars are red dwarfs). Astronomically, we refer to K and M type stars as red dwarfs. They're not very luminous (making them quite hard to detect) and they have the longest lifespan out of all stars on the main sequence due to their relatively low mass. The closest star to the Sun, Proxima Centauri, is a red dwarf!

The planet, Ross 508 b, has a minimum mass of about 4 times that of the Earth. As seen in the diagram above, the planet seems to follow an elliptical-like orbit, with a period of approximately 11 days. The distance between the planet and its host star is approximately 0.05AU (1AU is the average distance from the Earth to the Sun)! Whether or not water or life actually exists on the planet are questions of further study.

This discovery was one of the first made by a new instrument on the Subaru Telescope in Hawaii. Going forward, we can expect that the Subaru Telescope will discover more, potentially even better, candidates for habitable planets around nearby stars. :)

You can find out more about Ross 508 b via the NASA exoplanet catalog.

published: 02/08/22 by kaan evcimen, originally on ghost.io