Possible Planet Is Spotted Around Neighboring Sunlike Star
Its proximity also makes it alluring for astronomers, including a team that, on Thursday, provided the strongest evidence yet that a planet circles one of Alpha Centauri's sunlike stars. The world is at the very edge of the region around the star where liquid water can exist, known as the habitable zone.
Because it is made of gas, the planet itself would not support life as we know it. But the possible planet, discovered through observations from NASA's powerful James Webb Space Telescope, would be the closest ever found orbiting within a sunlike star's habitable zone. However, further observations are needed to confirm it is indeed a planet.
The find was announced in two papers that have been accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. It is a potential preview of the types of discoveries that will be possible in the future as astronomers' tools for hunting exoplanets — particularly ones like our Earth — evolve.
Three stars make up Alpha Centauri. But only two, Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B, are like our sun. They are locked in close orbit around each other. Circling this pair from farther away is a faint red dwarf known as Proxima Centauri.
The stars themselves are 'pretty run-of-the mill,' said Charles Beichman, an astronomer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the California Institute of Technology. But the system is a touchstone for investigations of stars like our sun, Dr. Beichman added, because cosmically speaking, 'it's right next door.'
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