Discovering more 'future houses' for humankind

International astronomers yesterday announced that they found a large planet full of conditions favorable to life outside the solar system.

Guillem Anglada-Escudé, an astronomer from Göttingen University in Germany, and his colleagues analyzed data about a star named GJ 667Cc of the Southern European Observatory. This is a dwarf star 22 light years from Earth and has a lower surface temperature than the sun.

Illustration of GJ 667Cc planet with star GJ 667C and two other planets.

The team found at least three planets moving around the star. GJ 667Cc, the name of the rock planet among them, flying very close to the star should receive the most light. It is possible that the surface temperature of GJ 667Cc is close to that of the earth, so water can exist on the planet, AFP reported.

GJ 667Cc circled around the star for 28.15 days - meaning that its year was just about a month of the earth. Its mass is at least 4.5 times greater than the globe.

'This planet is one of the most suitable bodies for water to exist in liquid form. Life forms can also exist on it, ' said Anglada-Escudé.

However, the existence of liquid water will remain a hypothesis until astronomers have more data about the atmosphere of GJ 667Cc.

If you include GJ 667Cc, the scientific world only discovered 4 planets capable of nurturing life. The surface temperature of those planets is not too high, not too low, so water can exist in liquid form - one of the conditions for life to form. The names of the other three planets are Kepler 22b (600 light-years from Earth), Gliese 581d (20 light-years from Earth), HD 85512 b (36 light-years from Earth).