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'Super-Earth' most likely to support life
By Nic Fleming, Science Correspondent
Last Updated: 2:12am BST 25/04/2007
Astronomers have found a planet on which conditions are the most conducive for extraterrestrial life of any so far discovered.
At 120 trillion miles from Earth, Gliese 581c is likely to be a target for future missions searching for extraterrestrial life
Gliese 581c is the first rocky, Earth-like planet to be observed where water could exist in liquid form, which is seen by scientists as a key ingredient for life.
With a radius only 50 per cent greater than Earth, it is the smallest of approximately 200 planets found outside our own Solar System, known as exoplanets.
Gliese 581c, possibly covered with oceans, is 120.5 trillion miles from Earth in the Libra constellation.
The planet was discovered by the same Swiss, French and Portuguese team that last year identified the first exoplanet in a "habitable zone", a region of space in which the heat from the nearest star is neither too hot nor too cold to sustain liquid water. However HD 69830d, as it is known, is thought to be more similar to Neptune or Uranus than Earth, and less likely to harbour life.
Most of the 213 exoplanets previously discovered have been gas giants and outside the habitable zone.
Stephane Udry, of the Geneva Observatory and leader of the team, said: "We have estimated that the mean temperature of this super-Earth lies between 0 and 40C, and water would thus be liquid."
Xavier Delfosse, a member of the team from Grenoble University in France, said:"Because of its temperature and relative proximity, this planet will most probably be a very important target of the future space missions dedicated to the search for extraterrestrial life.
The discovery was made using HARPS (High Accuracy Radial Velocity for Planetary Searcher), an instrument on a 12ft Southern Observatory telescope on a mountain top at La Silla, Chile.
'Super-Earth' most likely to support life
By Nic Fleming, Science Correspondent
Last Updated: 2:12am BST 25/04/2007
Astronomers have found a planet on which conditions are the most conducive for extraterrestrial life of any so far discovered.
At 120 trillion miles from Earth, Gliese 581c is likely to be a target for future missions searching for extraterrestrial life
Gliese 581c is the first rocky, Earth-like planet to be observed where water could exist in liquid form, which is seen by scientists as a key ingredient for life.
With a radius only 50 per cent greater than Earth, it is the smallest of approximately 200 planets found outside our own Solar System, known as exoplanets.
Gliese 581c, possibly covered with oceans, is 120.5 trillion miles from Earth in the Libra constellation.
The planet was discovered by the same Swiss, French and Portuguese team that last year identified the first exoplanet in a "habitable zone", a region of space in which the heat from the nearest star is neither too hot nor too cold to sustain liquid water. However HD 69830d, as it is known, is thought to be more similar to Neptune or Uranus than Earth, and less likely to harbour life.
Most of the 213 exoplanets previously discovered have been gas giants and outside the habitable zone.
Stephane Udry, of the Geneva Observatory and leader of the team, said: "We have estimated that the mean temperature of this super-Earth lies between 0 and 40C, and water would thus be liquid."
Xavier Delfosse, a member of the team from Grenoble University in France, said:"Because of its temperature and relative proximity, this planet will most probably be a very important target of the future space missions dedicated to the search for extraterrestrial life.
The discovery was made using HARPS (High Accuracy Radial Velocity for Planetary Searcher), an instrument on a 12ft Southern Observatory telescope on a mountain top at La Silla, Chile.
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