Once upon a time, school districts from coast to coast taught school children that there were 7 planets in total. Over the years and as new discoveries were made, that number slowly began to grow. But on Monday, that number exploded in an overwhelmingly big way!
The European Southern Observatory has just announced the discovery of more than 50 new exoplanets (which are outside our solar system), including 16 super-Earths with a size that is between 1 to 10 times that of the earth. And at least one of those planets may sustain life!
It’s called HD 85512 b, is about 3.6 times the mass of our own planet and is about 35 light years from Earth. According to scientists, HD 85512 b could theoretically be home to life if conditions are right. Its location is within the “Goldilocks zone” (not too hot, not too cold), with an estimated surface temperature of 77 degrees and the potential for liquid water under certain circumstances.
“In the coming 10 to 20 years we should have the first list of potentially habitable planets in the Sun’s neighbourhood. Making such a list is essential before future experiments can search for possible spectroscopic signatures of life in the exoplanet atmospheres,” said Michel Mayor from the HARPS discovery team.
According to NASA’s PlanetQuest website, scientists have confirmed the existence of 564 planets outside of our solar system,, not counting this latest batch of more than 50 just found. Beyond that, NASA’s Kepler mission has found more than 1,200 exoplanet candidates.
Could this be further proof that we are not alone in the universe?
Wow. All of this is incredible news to me! Without sounding too "religious"…I serve a BIG God. And if *He* so wills it, I have NO problem believing that *He* may have created Life on other planets in the universe.