• Question: what is the name of the planet which has been resently found to be a good example of life on another planet? :) (not mars)

    Asked by shannonbrown to Adam, Catherine, Karen, Leila, Nazim on 13 Mar 2012.
    • Photo: Adam Stevens

      Adam Stevens answered on 13 Mar 2012:

      Astronomers have managed to find a planet that they think might be quite like Earth.

      It orbits around a star and was discovered by the Kepler telescope, so it is imaginatively called Kepler-22b.

      Astronomers aren’t very good at naming things! Maybe you could come up with a better name?

    • Photo: Leila Battison

      Leila Battison answered on 13 Mar 2012:

      One of the first planets to be found that was just the right distance away from its star for water to be liquid on the surface was called Gliese 581g.

      It was the sixth planet to be discovered around the star called Gliese 581, so a, b, c, d, e, f,… g. Also not very imaginitive!

      Some more imaginitive people have taken to calling it Zarmina’s World though 🙂

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