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Thrilling Discovery of Seven Earth-Sized Planets Orbiting Nearby Star (theguardian.com)
At a press conference on Wednesday, NASA scientists announced that they have spotted seven Earth-sized planets orbiting closely around a small, ultra-cool star. The star is 39 light years away. From a report on The Guardian: It is the first time that so many Earth-sized planets have been found in orbit around the same star, an unexpected haul that suggests the Milky Way may be teeming with worlds that, in size and firmness underfoot at least, resemble our own rocky home. The planets closely circle a dwarf star named Trappist-1, which at 39 light years away makes the system a prime candidate to search for signs of life. Only marginally larger than Jupiter, the star shines with a feeble light about 2,000 times fainter than our sun. "The star is so small and cold that the seven planets are temperate, which means that they could have some liquid water and maybe life, by extension, on the surface," said Michael Gillon, an astrophysicist at the University of Liege in Belgium. [...] While the planets have Earth-like dimensions, their sizes ranging from 25 percent smaller to 10 percent larger, they could not be more different in other features. Most striking is how compact the planet's orbits are. Mercury, the innermost planet in the solar system, is six times farther from the sun than the outermost seventh planet is from Trappist-1.
How about: Bashful, Doc, Dopey, Happy, Sleepy, Sneezy and Grumpy?
Why would I not want to visit other planets that are the most likely so far to contain life?
Simple - it's a Trappist!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Anyone note how similar this system is to the solar system in Firefly?
This must be where we eventually go to form the Alliance.
Chimay be right, chimay be crazy..
Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
aliens are trolling earth astronomers by setting small neutron stars in orbit around suns.
Your guide to distant worlds:
http://i.imgur.com/6jp4DVK.png
Flawed! I don't know what "consentual" means, but surely don't rely on ASKING when determining if an alien is old enough. The alien I fucked SWORE to me it was 22, then I find out it's planet circles its sun every 90 MINUTES!
That's where God keeps Earth's backups.
I wonder how far back the oldest goes?
Table-ized A.I.
I don't see how it is improbable that they could not harbor life.
Quote of the day! I had to apply Boolean algebra to deduce your actual meaning.
That gravitational deflection could be caused by any nearby massive body, like yo' mama.