Kepler telescope discovers ‘bigger cousin to Earth’

Astronomers hunting for another Earth have found what may be the closest match yet, a potentially rocky planet circling its star at the same distance as the Earth orbits the Sun, NASA has said.

“It’s a small step in answering that question today”, said John Grunsfeld, NASA’s associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate.

“It is the closest thing that we have to another place that somebody else might call home”, said Jon Jenkins from NASA’s Ames Research Center in California.

Kepler-452 is 6 billion years previous, 1.5 billion years older than our solar, has the identical temperature, and is 20 % brighter and has a diameter 10 % bigger.

Kepler-452b is the first near-Earth-size world to be found in the habitable zone of star that is similar to our Sunday. “The sunshine from this star would feel very similar to the sunshine from our star”, Jenkins told reporters. The planet sits snugly within the “Goldilocks” habitable zone where the temperature is temperate and suitable for the water to remain in liquid form. The planet itself is “the closest twin, so to speak, to Earth 2.0” yet found in the Kepler data.

The new catalog includes 12 candidates that are less than twice the diameter of Earth and which are orbiting in the habitable zones of their stars.

Also, the planet could have a thick atmosphere, cloudy skies and active volcanoes. “That is considerable time and opportunity for life to arise somewhere on it surface or oceans if all the necessary conditions for life exist on this planet”. “You and I may not travel to any of these planets, but our children’s children may”. And because it’s spent so long orbiting in this zone – 6 billion years – it’s had plenty of time to brew life, Jenkins said.

The first near-Earth-size planet has been discovered around a sun-like star.

The planet is 5 percent farther from its sun than Earth. Crucially, the star around which Kepler-452b orbits is also remarkably similar to our own, further increasing the likelihood the planet can support life.

According to Wenz, the data sets used to confirm Kepler 452b “come from more refined techniques that can detect planets around even extremely faint stars”. As per reports, they all have different sizes and orbital distances from our planet. Kepler identifies potential planets by looking for periodic blips against the brightness of stars – some 150,000 stars to be exact. While a promising candidate for Earth-like conditions, Kepler-425b is 1400 light years away in the Cygnus constellation.