{"id":59193,"date":"2024-05-23T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-23T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/b738730b-fd23-4836-8d01-57f4b13f582a"},"modified":"2024-05-23T14:08:26","modified_gmt":"2024-05-23T14:08:26","slug":"a-planet-just-40-lightyears-away-could-support-human-life-if-it-has-an-atmosphere","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/rss_feed\/a-planet-just-40-lightyears-away-could-support-human-life-if-it-has-an-atmosphere\/","title":{"rendered":"A planet just 40 lightyears away could support human life… if it has an atmosphere"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>

By ezzy.pearson@ourmedia.co.uk\n <\/p>

Published: Thursday, 23 May 2024 at 14:00 PM<\/p>

\n\n

Gliese 12b, an exoplanet just 40 lightyears away, could be habitable<\/a> and capable of supporting human life, it was recently discovered.<\/p>

But you might want to hold off on packing your bags and heading to your spacecraft for a visit, as the planet\u2019s star might have blasted away its atmosphere.<\/p>

The potentially habitable exoplanet, Gliese 12b, is about the size of Venus, and in what is known as the Goldilocks Zone of its host star, where the temperature allows liquid water to persist on the surface.<\/p>

The surface temperature is an estimated 42\u00baC (107\u00baF) \u2013 warmer than the 15\u00baC (59\u00baF) average found here on Earth, but temperate enough that the planet\u2019s water would neither freeze nor boil away.<\/p>

\u201cThis is a really exciting discovery and will help our research into planets similar to Earth<\/a>,\u201d says Thomas Wilson from the University of Warwick.<\/p>

A artist’s impression of NASA’s TESS mission. Image Credit: NASA\/JPL-Caltech<\/figcaption><\/figure>
Gliese 12b was first discovered by NASA\u2019s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS)<\/a>, after which Wilson and his colleagues undertook follow-up observations to confirm its existence and then measure characteristics, such as size, temperature and distance from Earth.<\/p>
\u201cThe light we are seeing now is from 40 years ago \u2013 that\u2019s how long it has taken to reach us here on Earth,\u201d says Wilson. <\/p>
\u201c Planets like Gliese 12b<\/a> are few and far between, so for us to be able to examine one this closely and learn about its atmosphere and temperature is very rare,\u201d says Wilson.<\/p>
Exoplanets around red dwarfs<\/h2>
There is no guarentee Gliese 12b is a habitable exoplanet, as it differs from Earth in several key ways.<\/p>
It is much closer to its star, around 7% the Earth-Sun distance, and takes just 12.8 days to complete an orbit.<\/p>
The host star is a red dwarf about the quarter the size of our Sun and with a much lower surface temperature.<\/p>
This means despite Gliese 12b\u2019s proximity, it receives only 1.6 times more energy than the Earth does from the Sun.<\/p>
$\"Exoplanet$
Red dwarfs dimmer light makes it easier for astronomers to pick out the subtle signals coming from orbiting exoplanets. Credit: NASA<\/figcaption><\/figure>
Red dwarfs have become a popular target for studying exoplanets, as their dimmer light means it is easier to pull out the subtle signals that allow astronomers to examine exoplanet atmospheres.<\/p>
However, red dwarfs tend to be very magnetically active, meaning they produce frequent powerful flares that can strip away a planet\u2019s atmosphere.<\/p>
This star doesn\u2019t show signs of being extreme behaviour, meaning the team are hopeful of being able to find an atmosphere around the planet.<\/p>
\u201cWe know of only a handful of systems to date that are both close enough to us<\/a> and meet other criteria needed for this kind of study, called transmission spectroscopy, using current facilities,\u201d says Michael McElwain, from Goddard Space Flight Center who took part in the study. \u201cTo better understand the diversity of atmospheres around temperate planets similar to Earth, we need more examples like Gliese 12 b.\u201d<\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n
","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By ezzy.pearson@ourmedia.co.uk Published: Thursday, 23 May 2024 at 14:00 PM Gliese 12b, an exoplanet just 40 lightyears away, could be habitable and capable of supporting human life, it was recently discovered. But you might want to hold off on packing your bags and heading to your spacecraft for a visit, as the planet\u2019s star might […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":59194,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"3"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2024\/05\/a-planet-just-40-lightyears-away-could-support-human-life-if-it-has-an-atmosphere-scaled.jpg",2560,1440,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2024\/05\/a-planet-just-40-lightyears-away-could-support-human-life-if-it-has-an-atmosphere-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2024\/05\/a-planet-just-40-lightyears-away-could-support-human-life-if-it-has-an-atmosphere-300x169.jpg",300,169,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2024\/05\/a-planet-just-40-lightyears-away-could-support-human-life-if-it-has-an-atmosphere-768x432.jpg",768,432,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2024\/05\/a-planet-just-40-lightyears-away-could-support-human-life-if-it-has-an-atmosphere-1024x576.jpg",800,450,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2024\/05\/a-planet-just-40-lightyears-away-could-support-human-life-if-it-has-an-atmosphere-1536x864.jpg",1536,864,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2024\/05\/a-planet-just-40-lightyears-away-could-support-human-life-if-it-has-an-atmosphere-2048x1152.jpg",2048,1152,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By ezzy.pearson@ourmedia.co.uk Published: Thursday, 23 May 2024 at 14:00 PM Gliese 12b, an exoplanet just 40 lightyears away, could be habitable and capable of supporting human life, it was recently discovered. But you might want to hold off on packing your bags and heading to your spacecraft for a visit, as the planet\u2019s star might…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/59193"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}