NASA Discovers First Earth-Size Planets Beyond Our Solar System

Earth-class Planets Line Up



This chart compares the first Earth-size planets found around a sun-like star to planets in our own solar system, Earth and Venus. NASA's Kepler mission discovered the new found planets, called Kepler-20e and Kepler-20f.

Link - http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/multimedia/images/kepler-20-planet-lineup.html


December 20, 2011

PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA's Kepler mission has discovered the first Earth-size planets orbiting a sun-like star outside our solar system. The planets, called Kepler-20e and Kepler-20f, are too close to their star to be in the so-called habitable zone where liquid water could exist on a planet's surface, but they are the smallest exoplanets ever confirmed around a star like our sun.

The discovery marks the next important milestone in the ultimate search for planets like Earth. The new planets are thought to be rocky. Kepler-20e is slightly smaller than Venus, measuring 0.87 times the radius of Earth. Kepler-20f is slightly larger than Earth, measuring 1.03 times its radius. Both planets reside in a five-planet system called Kepler-20, approximately 1,000 light-years away in the constellation Lyra.

Link - http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-390
Link - http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/news/kepler-20-system_prt.htm


Kepler-20 system: 5 planets including two that are Earth-size
Link - http://kepler.nasa.gov/news/index.cfm?FuseAction=ShowNews&NewsID=172


NASA's Kepler Mission Home Page
Link - http://kepler.nasa.gov/