SoylentNews

takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

In 2014, we reported on a "potentially habitable" exoplanet five times the mass of Earth found 16 light years away [soylentnews.org]. Now we bring you a "potentially habitable" exoplanet at least 4.25 times the mass of Earth found 14 light years away [unsw.edu.au]:

"While a few other planets have been found that orbit stars closer to us than Wolf 1061, those planets are not considered to be remotely habitable," Dr Wright says.

The three newly detected planets orbit the small, relatively cool and stable star about every 5, 18 and 67 days. Their masses are at least 1.4, 4.3 and 5.2 times that of Earth, respectively. The larger outer planet falls just outside the outer boundary of the habitable zone and is also likely to be rocky, while the smaller inner planet is too close to the star to be habitable.

[...] The UNSW team made the discovery using observations of Wolf 1061 collected by the HARPS spectrograph on the European Southern Observatory's 3.6 metre telescope in La Silla in Chile.

Three planets orbiting Wolf 1061 [unsw.edu.au] [full paper]

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