That is pretty cool, but what makes this latest discovery so cool is that the planet sits within the habitable zone of it's star.
From the
PAPER (Pdf):
"However, if confirmed, the 37-day planet candidate offers a solid case for a potentially
habitable planet in this very nearby system. The best Keplerian fit to the data indicates
a 3.1M⊕ planet in a circular 36.6-day orbit of semi-major axis 0.146 AU. The dynamical
stability investigations presented by Mayor09 also impose a lower bound on the orbital
plane inclination, constraining the upper bound on the mass of GJ 581g to be no more
than 1.6 times its minimum mass. We find a similar bound of about 1.4 assuming none
of the orbital eccentricities exceed 0.2. So, the likely mass for this planet candidate is
3.1 – 4.3M⊕. Using the results of Seager et al. (2007), the radius of GJ 581g is expected to
be 1.3 – 1.5R⊕ if homogeneous and composed primarily of the perovskite phase of MgSiO3
(Earth-like), or 1.7 – 2R⊕ if water-ice. All radii are predicted to be ~ 20% smaller if the
planet is differentiated, so the planet is likely to have a radius below 1.5R⊕. The mass and
radius estimates imply a surface gravity of ~ 1.1 – 1.7 g, very near that of the Earth."
*The Lick-Carnegie Exoplanet Survey: A 3.1M Planet in the
Habitable Zone of the Nearby M3V Star Gliese 581
Steven S. Vogt1, R. Paul Butler2, E. J. Rivera1, N. Haghighipour3, Gregory W. Henry4,
and Michael H. Williamson4
How cool is that?
"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." - Aristotle
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