However, said planet hasn’t been located yet, but based on the team’s extensive study of red dwarf stars, they believe it’s there. According to their research, 60% of the galaxy’s most ubiquitous stars most likely host planets that are smaller than Neptune, and about 6% of them host Earth-sized planets that are orbiting in the “Goldilocks” zone, where life is may be possible.

While 13 light-years may seem ridiculous, astronomers say that this nearest Earth-like planet is just right next door, based on the overall size of the universe. According to lead author and Harvard University grad student Courtney Dressing, if the Milky Way galaxy was shrunk to the size of the US, the distance between Earth and the closest Earth-like planet would be the span of Central Park in New York City.

However, while these planets may be “Earth-like,” they’re possibly quite different than Earth because of the differences between their red dwarf stars and our sun. Plus, these planets could be far older than our solar system, meaning that any potential life forms on these planets could be much more evolved than on Earth. Our solar system is around 4.5 billion years old, while the nearest Earth-like planet is possibly 12 billion years old.

Scientists and astronomers say that the closest planet is just within reach, and future spacecrafts may be able to locate these planets and provide some vital information that would advance what we know about life on other planets. These latest findings are based on data from NASA’s Kepler space telescope, which launched in 2009.

[via ABC News]

A new analysis of the data shows that about 17% of stars have an Earth-sized planet in an orbit closer than Mercury — that’s about one in every six star systems. Since the Milky Way has about 100 billion stars, that means there are at least 17 billion Earth-sized orbs out there floating around. However, not all of them are necessarily Earth-like.

It’s important to note that this number only includes those planets which are in close proximity to their respective stars which is a distance that places them outside the solar system’s habitable zone, or orbits that are about 85 days or less. Right now, it’s very difficult to detect small planets further out because of the limitation of current telescopic technologies.

During the investigation, the astronomers surveyed about 2,400 candidate planets spotted by the Kepler satellite over the first 16 months of its operation. Fressin’s figures took into account an obvious effect: the only planets that can be detected are the ones that pass along the same plane as the Earth, which required the astronomers to do some guessing.

A challenge for the astronomers will be to detect Earth-sized and Earth-like planets that sit farther out in space. However, because they orbit less frequently, they are less susceptible to detection by astronomers and scientists. However, it’s a problem that will likely be solved by due diligence and large amounts of patience.

The planet is dubbed CFBDSIR2149, and it’s said to be four to seven times larger than Jupiter, which is our solar system’s largest planet. It also appears to be a “free-floating” planet, meaning that it doesn’t orbit around another sun. Of course, discovering planets like these isn’t rare, but astronomers say that the planet is only 100 light-years away, making it the closest rogue planet to the Earth.

Initial observations coined the planet as either a homeless planet or a tiny failed star called a “brown dwarf,” which lacks the power to trigger the nuclear fusion that makes stars shine. However, the astronomers noted that CFBDSIR2149 is roaming near a stream of young stars called the AB Doradus Moving Group, and that has allowed the astronomers to estimate the planet’s age to between 50 and 120 million years old, with a temperature of around 400 degrees C (750 degrees F).

Philippe Delorme of France’s Institute of Planetology and Astrophysics says that “these objects are important, as they can either help us understand more about how planets may be ejected from planetary systems, or how very light objects can arise from the star formation process.” He continues by noting that if CFBDSIR2149 “is a planet that has been ejected from its native system, it conjures up the striking image of orphaned worlds, drifting in the emptiness of space.”

[via Time]

P5 was discovered as NASA’s Pluto team used the Hubble Space Telescope to scan the area surrounding the planet for debris or anything else (like undiscovered moons, perhaps?) that may damage or destroy NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft as it flies through the Pluto system in 2015. NASA says that with New Horizons travelling at 30,000 miles per hour, the spacecraft could be destroyed by a piece of debris the size of a BB. “The discovery of so many small moons indirectly tells us that there must be lots of small particles lurking unseen in the Pluto system,” says Harold Weaver of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.

Indeed, as strange as it may seem, NASA scientists are discovering moons orbiting Pluto at something of an alarming rate. It was only last year that P4 was discovered, and before that came the discovery of Nix and Hyrda in 2006. Up until that point, we thought that the only moon orbiting Pluto was Charon, which was discovered back in 1978.

As for how P5 came into existence, the Pluto team thinks that it was formed when Pluto collided with another celestial body billions of years ago, much in the same way scientists believe our own moon was formed. Take a look at our story timeline below for more interesting stories from space!

[via NASA]

It’s long been a hypothesis that Titan, and other moons far in the deep reaches of the solar system, are capable of holding water underneath their surfaces, but the lack of technology makes it impossible to test these theories. There is however a spacecraft called Cassini, which has been in the Saturn area since 2004. It is the primary source in providing new information about the planet and its moons.

“Liquid water elsewhere in the solar system is one of the main goals of planetary exploration for NASA,” said study lead author Luciano Iess, a planetary geodesist at Università La Sapienza in Rome. “This discovery points to the fact that many satellites in the outer solar system hide large amounts of liquid water,” said planetary geodesis and lead author of the latest study Luciano Iess.

[via MSNBC]

No, it’s going to be a whoping 728 feet taller. The new building, which is proposed to be near the heart of Azerbaijan’s capital city Bakou, would be 3,445 feet high. The Burj Khalifa, which was completed in 2010, reaches a height of “only” 2,717 feet. The building itself will cost $2 billion to construct. It’s set to be the crown jewel of a new area of wild development, as Azerbaijan works to create an ‘artificial archipelago’ on the shores of the Caspian Sea.

The building will be able to house an amazing 189 floors – 29 more than the current world record holder. The company at the heart of the proposal, Avesta, says that if approved it could begin construction in 2015, and would be able to have the project habitable no later than 2019. The surrounding development plans for the massive Azerbaijan expansion is expected to take about 10 years, so that by 2022 it will be the new mecca of the Middle East.

[via Gizmag]

The big list of contributors here brings on “a new paradigm of space” for the future, these contributors noting that they’ve got a “Silicon Valley of Space” on their hands here with a “near infinite” amount of resources available to them in near-Earth asteroids. Have a peek at the full list of contributors to this project after the demonstration video here and get pumped up about it all. We’re” expanding our reach beyond Earth into the solar system” – that’s the aim here!

“The company was founded by space visionary Peter H. Diamandis, M.D. and leading commercial space entrepreneur Eric Anderson, and is supported by an impressive investor and advisor group, including Google’s Larry Page & Eric Schmidt, Ph.D.; film maker & explorer James Cameron; Chairman of Intentional Software Corporation and Microsoft’s former Chief Software Architect Charles Simonyi, Ph.D.; Founder of Sherpalo and Google Board of Directors founding member K. Ram Shriram; and Chairman of Hillwood and The Perot Group Ross Perot, Jr.” – Planetary Resources

According to Planetary Resources, there are 9,000 known NEAs (near Earth asteroids) right now with 1,500 of them energetically as easy for us to reach as th emoon. As Chris Lewicki, President and Chief Engineer notes today: “Our mission is not only to expand the world’s resource base, but we want to increase people’s access to, and understanding of, our planet and solar system by developing capable and cost-efficient systems.” This project, says Eric Anderson, Co-Founder and Co-Chairman, Planetary Resources, Inc., will be up and running inside 24 months.

This project is sure to expand over the coming days, weeks, and even years as we continue to follow this groups initiatives into our near-earth space. We’re excited for them to move forward!

The most interesting of the planetary systems in the newly discovered group is called Kepler-33. This star is bigger and older than our sun. It has five planets and the cool part is that all five of the planets orbit the parent star at a distance closer to that of Mars to the Sun. The planets are all larger than Earth as well ranging from 1.5 times the Earth’s diameter to five times Earth diameter.

At this point, the scientists studying the planets don’t know if they are rocky planets like Earth and Mars or if they are gas giants like Saturn or Jupiter. There are 2,300 other planet candidates that the scientists still need to confirm. Nine of the other newly discovered planetary systems have two planets and one has three with all of those planets orbiting closer to the host planet than Venus to the sun.

[via Telegraph]