The planet – Wolf 1061c – is just 14 light years away, which astronomically-speaking is just a stone’s throw away, says a team of astronomers at the University of New South Wales in Australia. Exoplanet is a planet that orbits outside the solar system. Wolf 1061, a dwarf star, is its orbiting star. Wolf 1061. The Astrophysical Journal Letters will publish the scientists’ study, according to them. Wolf 1061, and the orbiting planets. Shaded green is the habitable zone. (Image: newsroom.unsw.edu.au) Lead author, Dr. Duncan Wright, and colleagues detected three exoplanets orbiting the dwarf star. Wolf (*]c has a mass four times that of Earth. Scientists believe that there may be life elsewhere in the Universe, and that some life might even be smarter or more intelligent than us. The scientific community anticipated that any discovery would take place thousands of light-years from Earth. Wolf (*c) is located in the “Goldilocks zone” While the three other planets orbiting Wolf 1061, are likely to have rocky surfaces, Wolf (*c) is the only one within the “Goldilocks zone”. The Habitable Zone is also called the Circumstellar Habitable Zone. It is the area around a star that a planet can have temperatures, atmosphere pressure and liquid water that are ‘just right to sustain life. Dr. Wright stated that it was an exciting discovery because the three planets have low enough masses to make them rocky, as well as having solid surfaces. Wolf (*c), the middle planet is located within this ‘Goldilocks zone, where liquid water, or life, might exist. It is amazing to see the immense space, to think of a star just a few degrees from us, which could be a nearby neighbor, to host a planet. Although a handful of other planets orbiting stars nearer to Wolf 1061, have been discovered, these planets aren’t considered remotely habitable. The constellation Ophiucus is located close to the red dwarf star Wolf 1061, which also includes the unrelated star cluster Messier 104.. Wolf 1061, is 14 light years away from Earth. (Image: newsroom.unsw.edu.au. Credit to UNSW/The Aladin Sky Atlas. A potential habitable planet orbits Wolf 1061. Wolf is a stable, small star that orbits approximately every 67, and five days. They are approximately 5.2, 3.0, and 1.4% heavier than Earth. Although the largest falls outside of the Goldilocks Zone boundary, it is most likely to be rock. It is not habitable because it lies too close to its star. The discovery was made by Dr. Wright’s colleagues using data from the HARPS spectrograph at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) 3.6-metre telescope located in La Silla (Chile). Head of UNSW’s Exoplanetary Science group Professor Chris Tinney said that the team developed an improved technique to analyze the data from the precise, purposely built, planet-hunting instrument. They have made more than 10 years of observations of Wolf . Astronomers say there are many small, rocky, similar-looking planets in our galaxy, the Milky Way. Multi-planets are common as well. Nearly all of the rocky exoplanets discovered so far are located hundreds to thousands of light-years away. For example, an exoplanet that is ten thousand lightyears from Earth would mean everything we find was ten thousands years old. Everything we find on Wolf 1061,c was only 14 years old. Gliese 667Cc is 22 lightyears from Earth. This discovery has been beaten by this latest one. It orbits the red dwarf star every 28 day and is at least 4.5x as large as any other planet. Dr. Rob Wittenmyer stated that there was a high chance the planets surrounding Wolf 1061, could pass through the star’s face. It is possible that they will, and it might be possible to examine the atmospheres on these planets in the future to determine if they are conducive for life. Video – Near potentially habitable planet. This video shows a simulation showing the Wolf 1061, system’s orbital configuration.
