new earth-like planet discovered by Kiwi couple

[tank girl]

They're calling it a "twin earth" but its surface temperature is -220 c...however - its the closest thing yet found in the skies that resembles our humble abode.

The new planet is five times the size of the Earth and is considered a "low-mass" planet like the Earth.
* About 170 new planets have been discovered since 1995, but this is the most Earth-like.
* It orbits a red star, a fifth of the size of the sun, near the centre of the Milky Way galaxy.
* The planet's surface is believed to be rock or ice and the surface temperature is estimated to be about -220C.
* It would take a beam of light, travelling at 300,000km a second, 25,000 years to travel from Earth to the newly discovered planet.

("NZ pair help find Earth's distant cousin". Jarrod Booker;'THE NZ HERALD'; 26/01/06)
source

 

[Gonz]

Get some Packsrds up there & start the greenhouse gases.

 

[chcr]

Get some Packsrds up there & start the greenhouse gases.

Gotta invent FTL travel first.

 

[Gonz]

If we wait that long, they'll have terra-forming down to an art.

 

[chcr]

If we wait that long, they'll have terra-forming down to an art.

Erm, if we don't, it'll take a few hundred thousand years to get there and back.