Mercury, the closest planet to the sun in our solar system, orbits at 36 million miles.
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Researchers also found that the star alternately moved towards and away from our Solar system at about five kilometres per hour.
Even Starshot is still a few years and technological advancements away, but having a real exoplanet to study when we finally get there is a huge benefit that will surely be worked into those plans-and could boost the drive to make them happen.
The findings appear in the journal Nature.
“An absolutely awesome discovery”, says Victoria Meadows of the University of Washington.
“To have the nearest star with a possibly habitable Earth-sized planet is terrific”, Guinan says. Confounding their speculations is the fact that astronomers know little about the early evolution of long-lived red dwarf stars. Much study was put into Proxima Centauri because Red Dwarf stars have processes that can mimic the presence of a planet. Accordingly, scientists have called the newly discovered planet “Proxima b”. Finally, the astronomers say the planet has a minimum mass of 1.3 Earth masses. It is probably rocky, like Earth, and not a Jupiter-like ball of gas.
Of course, it may not have an atmosphere, a prerequisite for life.
Scientists have discovered thousands of planets orbiting distant stars, including a bunch that might be potentially habitable.
Astronomers hope to one day take images of the planet itself to find out if does have an atmosphere.
The experience of living on Proxima b would be quite alien compared to Earth.
The planet has some features that may lower likelihood of it actually supporting life. That quiver translates into barely detectable changes in the light streaming from the star. So it will be decades before it can be confirmed if there is life on this planet, unless we hear from them first.
The newly discovered planet has been temporarily named Proxima B by its discoverers, an worldwide team led by astronomer Guillem Anglada-Escudé at Queen Mary University in London.
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While astronomers have found numerous other planets similar to Earth, this one is particularly exciting. Analysis could reveal molecules that would be telltale signs of life. He thinks the news that our closest stellar neighbor is orbited by a world that has a shot at possibly supporting life is sure to spur interest in an interstellar mission to pay it a visit. But Promixa B is the closest one to date, and potentially one that we could visit even traveling below the speed of light.
