New Venus-like planet discovered

The rocky planet is slightly larger than the Earth and, like Venus, its surface is too hot to support liquid

A Venus-like planet has been discovered in a solar system relatively close to our own, in what some astronomers are describing as the most important “exoplanet” found orbiting a star other than the Sun.

The rocky planet, called GJ 1132b, is slightly larger than the Earth and, like Venus, its surface is too hot to support liquid water, and so, scientists believe the planet will be invaluable in the search for extraterrestrial life; however, it may still be cool enough to have a substantial atmosphere.



Dr Zachory Berta-Thompson of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology writes in journal Nature states, “The temperature of the planet is about as hot as your oven will go, so it’s like burnt-cookie hot. It’s too hot to be habitable. There’s no way there’s liquid water on the surface, but it’s cooler than the other rocky planets that we know of.”

Planet GJ 1132b orbits so close to its own star that its temperatures reach a scorching 232C °. It is said to have a predominantly helium and hydrogen atmosphere, but there is a possibility of the presence of oxygen and carbon dioxide if the planet had water on its surface in its past.

David Charbonneau of the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who led the study of the planet, writes, “Our ultimate goal is to find a twin Earth, but along the way we’ve found a twin Venus. We suspect it will have a Venus-like atmosphere too, and if it does we can’t wait to get a whiff.”

Although astronomers say it is currently difficult to draw conclusions, the planet, being 39 light years away and orbiting its star once every 1.6 days can be directly observed using the next generation of space telescopes to study its atmosphere.



“We finally have a target to point our telescopes at and dig much deeper into the workings of a rocky exoplanet and what makes it tick…. This planet is cool enough that it can retain an atmosphere. So, we think this planet probably still has something of a substantial atmosphere in its current state,” said Dr Berta-Thompson.

He added, “With the James Webb Space Telescope, we will be able to observe the colour of this planet's sunset, sense the heat emanating from its toasted surface, and estimate the speed of its winds.”

The planet was discovered by MEarth-South telescope array, which monitors several thousand red dwarf stars located within 100 light-years of Earth.

Scientists calculated that the planet is orbiting at a distance of 1.4 million miles from the star, compared to the 36 million miles between the Earth and the Sun. With a diametre of around 9,200 miles, it is about 16% larger than the Earth, and although it’s solar orbit is much closer than that of our own planet, its sun is a “red dwarf” star far smaller than the Sun. Similar to how the Moon orbits around the Earth, one side of Planet GJ 1132b’s surface permanently faces its star, while the other always points out to space.



Dr Berta-Thompson pointed out the significance of the planet’s discovery, writing, “If we find this pretty hot planet has managed to hang onto its atmosphere over the billions of years it’s been around, that bodes well for the long-term goal of studying cooler planets that could have life.”

“We think it’s the first opportunity we have to point our telescopes at a rocky exoplanet and get that kind of detail, to be able to measure the colour of its sunset, or the speed of its winds, and really learn how rocky planets work out there in the Universe,” he added.

This article originally appeared on The Independent.