back to article Latest exoplanet discovery is a virtual CLONE of Earth

Astroboffins poring through data from NASA's Kepler telescope have spotted what they think might be the most Earth-like planet yet discovered. The object has a radius 1.5 times that of Earth, which lumps it into the class of extrasolar planets known as "super Earths." That's not so unusual, in and of itself; scientists …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.
  1. Pen-y-gors

    Thanks

    > slightly longer than Venus's 225-day year but shorter than our own 365-day one.

    Ta for the reminder of how many days there are in a terran year - I can NEVER remember!

    1. Annihilator
      Headmaster

      Re: Thanks

      Ta for the reminder of how many days there are in a terran year - I can NEVER remember!

      It's closer to 365.256 ;-)

      1. Steven Roper
        Coat

        Well, while we're being pedantic...

        ...365.256 days is only true if you're measuring the sidereal year (fixed star to fixed star). And it's 365.256363004 as of epoch J2000.0 to be precise... a ten-millionth of a second's accuracy is still a measurable period of time after all! And what about the tropical (equinox to equinox) year of 365.24219 days, or the anomalistic (aphelion to aphelion, or more generally any apsis to apsis) year of 365.259636 days? Which "year" are we referring to exactly?

        No wonder Pen-y-gors can't remember! ;-)

        1. DanDanDan

          Re: Well, while we're being pedantic...

          Well, if pedantry is the game, how about the fact that this planet is 3 times larger than earth? Since when was 3 times bigger "similarly sized"? If my clone was 3 times larger than me, someone would say the cloning process had failed fundamentally.

          1. Charlie van Becelaere

            Re: Well, while we're being pedantic...

            continuing in that vein ...

            It's more like 3.375 times as big, thus 2.375 times bigger, hardly 3 times, wouldn't you say?

            What do they teach in schools these days?

        2. AndrueC Silver badge
          Joke

          Re: Well, while we're being pedantic...

          > 365.256 days is only true if you're measuring the sidereal year

          What? You'll be telling me that the Earth doesn't revolve about its axis in 24 hours next!

          1. Steve the Cynic

            Re: Well, while we're being pedantic...

            "You'll be telling me that the Earth doesn't revolve about its axis in 24 hours next!"

            It doesn't revolve around its own axis at all. It *rotates* around its axis and *revolves* around the Sun!

  2. Mister_C

    just call me picky

    but how far away is it? doesn't appear to be mentioned in the article or links, and it kind of makes a difference between "oh, that's nice to know" and "book me a flight, I'm there"

    1. Martin Budden Silver badge
      WTF?

      Re: just call me picky

      Book you a flight? Please tell me which kind of craft you have in mind, I'd love to know!

      1. Katie Saucey
        Angel

        Re: just call me picky

        I'll take the first General Contact Unit that's headed in the right direction.

        1. Rattus Rattus

          Re: just call me picky

          I'd rather the comfort of a GSV, myself.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Happy

            Re: just call me picky

            But there could be nasties out there. I think I'll borrow a GOU.

          2. ContentsMayVary

            Re: just call me picky

            >>I'd rather the comfort of a GSV, myself.

            Just try to avoid the Sleeper Service. That's my advice.

            1. AndrueC Silver badge
              Alert

              Re: just call me picky

              And if you fancy a trip in a GCU I think avoiding Meatfucker née Grey Area would be wise. I think it might be in league with Teresa May.

  3. hi_robb
    Alien

    May I be the first

    To welcome our new Kepler based clever dolphin earth overlords

    1. hplasm
      Alien

      Re: May I be the first

      Dasorians?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: May I be the first

      Alah is gonna be pissed

  4. Martin Budden Silver badge
    Coat

    So long, and thanks...

    There must also be fish there if there are very clever dolphins there. There might even be bowls of petunias. Definitely mice.

    1. Esskay
      Coat

      "there must also be fish there"

      A Koi pond, perhaps?

    2. Lars Silver badge
      Coat

      Re: So long, and thanks...

      I Wonder in which direction "science" is moving with sentence like "but perhaps very clever dolphins", I bet they are red with green stripes, revealing this just to help science in the new and so interesting direction.

      1. MrT

        I scan-read...

        ...'Mario Livio' and momentarily thought it was a Nintendo Broadway show...

      2. Richard 12 Silver badge

        Re: So long, and thanks...

        Presumably the PR people thought "clever sharks" didn't sound as good, so went with dolphins - and to hell with the science of how dolphins evolved.

        A water world would be a fish world, unless it had a significantly dry period for land-based animals to evolve. Milk is difficult in water.

        1. VinceH

          Re: So long, and thanks...

          "Presumably the PR people thought "clever sharks" didn't sound as good, so went with dolphins."

          Yeah, and probably realised that clever sharks are a hell of a lot scarier, having watched that documentary presented by Sammuel L Jackson, "Deep Blue Sea"

      3. larokus

        Re: So long, and thanks...

        Are they using their own smartphone browser?

    3. I think so I am?
      Thumb Up

      Re: So long, and thanks...

      And a decomposing sperm whale! and some hotdog satellites

  5. Christoph
    Boffin

    How old is the star?

    Is the star old enough for life to have evolved on the planet? I can't see any information on that

    And is it anywhere near the 4.5 billion years that Earth needed to have a technology using species?

    1. Graham 24

      Re: How old is the star?

      Earth could have had technology-using species several times over by now. We can barely tell what was going on in classical Greek / Roman times, and anything further back that 10,000 years is purely speculation. Any remains of a now-dead advanced civilisation from say, half a billion years ago (a mere 11% of the planet's lifetime) will be long gone, probably swallowed up by the actions of plate tectonics, and buried in molten magma.

      1. Grave

        Re: How old is the star?

        was just going to write something similar (but instead of buried i was gonna say recycled), thumbs up :)

        and what kind of materials (buildings/machines) would survive ages under such a pressure and heat.

        i havent really given a thought on how long it takes satelites/exploration craft like those on mars to disappear/disintegrate completely. i guess much less than 500my

      2. Originone
        Thumb Down

        Re: How old is the star?

        Nonsense, there is plenty of fossil evidence of what life was like 500 million yeas ago, and that's because there is plenty of rock at the planets surface that is 500 million years old. In fact there are rocks in Australia that are older than 3 billion years. The surface of earth is not 100% recycled in any given time frame, so if there ever was a previous "advanced civilisation" it would have left an indelible mark somewhere.

        1. Allan George Dyer
          Holmes

          Re: How old is the star?

          "would have left an indelible mark somewhere" - really? The chances of an individual becoming fossilised are generally pretty small, and the same would be true of most of our technology. That iron oxide stain next to your newly discovered velociraptor fossil? Maybe it was driving a car. Maybe a large building could survive, but the Lighthouse of Alexandria didn't, and the Pyramids are looking a bit tatty after only a few thousand years. You could easily miss them if you're not looking in the right place.

          1. toof4st

            Re: How old is the star?

            Any evidence of human existence on earth may well be gone after a few hundred thousand years, but any visiting aliens will still be able to find the lunar rover, still up on the moon. It's up there. After all, we did visit the moon. No really we did. Honest.

            Actually, assuming (pretending) there are things like lunar rovers on the moon, and they survive many million years, while evidence of human existence here on earth all but disappears, the next intelligent species to inhabit the earth will get a bit of a shock, when they final land on the moon. "Hang on, I thought we were first?"

            1. NomNomNom

              Re: How old is the star?

              surely human civilization will leave a highly anomalous layer in the geological record that prove we existed. Plenty of natural systems are being perturbed unnaturally. Eg the carbon cycle, the nitrogen cycle. Loads of gases being emitted that are artificial and have never existed before on earth like CFCs. There's too much to not leave a trace.

              1. gromm

                Re: How old is the star?

                Or, far more easily traced, that wee layer of radioactive matter we managed to scatter into the atmosphere while we were testing bombs out in the open like that.

                That tends to be a pretty good marker for intelligent and technologically advanced - albeit highly destructive - civilization. And it's not going anywhere either. There've been asteroid impacts that have shown up in geological layers just the same way, just not as radioactive.

            2. Allan George Dyer
              Alien

              "Hang on, I thought we were first?" Re: How old is the star?

              @toof4st - that sounds like the abandoned first draft of 2001 - A Space Odyssey . An ancient, mysterious technological artefact is found on the moon, it does nothing when discovered because it was created by an entirely extinct species, and nothing happens for the remainder of the film (in the book, an insane AI deletes all the research papers based on the artefact, because of a numeric overflow in the dates).

          2. AndrueC Silver badge
            Thumb Up

            Re: How old is the star?

            I agree. I doubt anything we've built on the surface of the Earth will last more than a few hundreds of thousands of years. The fossil record might point to a curious mass extinction event though and perhaps the geographic record would show a subtle layer of radioactivity and/or other pollutants.

            No what would most likely survive as a monument would be the artefacts left on the Moon. Presumably they will last as long as the Moon itself.

        2. Avatar of They
          Thumb Up

          Re: How old is the star?

          You miss the point a little. Something 500 million years ago only comes to the surface if plate tectonics move it nearer the surface or human messing with mines and buildings dig one up. Perhaps a natural erosional process brings them to the front such as coastal erosion.

          Given the way the world works we are having to dig tens of feet down to uncover roman remains from 2000 years ago (if you watch the time team at work). So it all depends on where you are talking about as to whether the earths surface is recycled.

          If they built there mark at the bottom of the med it would have gone when the alps were formed and the med filled in after it was cut off and dried out.

          It is was built in the himalayas it would be destroyed when India hit the Asian continent and formed the himalayas. (and still does)

          Nothing is indellible.

      3. dssf

        Re: How old is the star?

        Ah, but, what if that "now-dead advanced civilisation" sported sentient-being-satellites? Hopefully, they would have avoided excessive world wars, and hopefully they even managed to have"their-a-world-a-formed" (since they probably would not have called themselves Terrans) one or more of their moons or nearby planets. If they did that, even if they are extinct, and even ifffff they have not links to us a la Battlestar Galactica (TRS), it would be Earth-shattering a find if something creature-made were discovered operating as a beacon.

        GODS, this is so exciting. Unfortunately, I feel that we will not in the next 45 years or so uncontrollably discover nor publicly be told of such a discovery. Still, finds such as these get me all giddy.

    2. Thorne

      Re: How old is the star?

      "And is it anywhere near the 4.5 billion years that Earth needed to have a technology using species?"

      If it wasn't for religion we could have been a lot more technologically advanced well beyond what we are now.

      Perhaps the aliens weren't so stupid which explains why they can make spacecraft capable of flying between stars.

      The aliens who did invent religion are most likely still at home killing each other with rocks...

      1. KrisMac
        Boffin

        Re: How old is the star?

        Both the Grandparent and the respondents are kind of right in this argument it seems to me...

        Yes it took 4.5 billion years for US to evolve as a technology using specied, but that is primarily down to the random disatsers that overtook, (brought to a dramatic end!) the evolutionary development of the previous series of dominant species that had climbed that far up the slope.

        If left to themselves, (as opposed to bing mericlessly crushed back into primordial forms by a hurtling chunk of space rock), who is to say that the first technological speiced to evolve on THIS planet might not have been more closely related to iguana's than humans...

        1. KrisMac
          Facepalm

          Re: How old is the star?

          And with their more dexterous hands their typing might have been a lot less inclined to random error than mine....

          Apologies for typo's in previous post...

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Facepalm

          Re: How old is the star?

          " ... primarily down to the random disatsers ..."

          Do you mean like the re-election of Obama?

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: How old is the star?

            lannorthhants - Donald Trump, is that you?!

      2. Winkypop Silver badge
        Thumb Up

        Re: How old is the star?

        "The aliens who did invent religion are most likely still at home killing each other with rocks..."

        Sentence of the week, well played that person!

      3. Valeyard

        Re: How old is the star?

        "Perhaps the aliens weren't so stupid which explains why they can make spacecraft capable of flying between stars."

        woah, what'd I miss? or was your unprovoked graunia zeolotry just starting to turn into a little bit of a rant?

        I'm not a religious man myself, but a lot of good science came from muslimism back in t'day (there was a series of documentaries on it on tv not long back) and christianity hardly excommunicates me for typing this on the devil's box

    3. Swiss Anton

      Re: How old is the star?

      Even when everything about the exoplanet is perfect, I wonder what the chances are of life getting started and surviving long enough to evolve into something that can thrive under normal conditions. Is this inevitable or are we just very very very very lucky? BTW, I've no problem with intelligent life evolving from slime (given time), I think that is inevitable. I just worry about where the slime could come from in the first place.

    4. larokus

      Re: How old is the star?

      One would hope not or surely the planets native ecosystem is quickly crumbling much as our own!! :))

  6. John Browne 1

    Fine, but does it have a large moon?

    And a reasonable magnetic field?

    Might make a difference. Or not. It would be interesting to find out.

    1. AceRimmer1980
      Pirate

      Re: Fine, but does it have a large moon?

      Yes, it does. Oh wait, that's no moon.

      Where'd the planet go?

    2. Bod

      Magnetic field / shield

      From what I understand, a magnetic shield is essential for life to survive even if it's in the right location. How they can prove the planet would have one, considering the majority are nothing more than a tiny blip of data, I'm not sure.

      1. gromm

        Re: Magnetic field / shield

        Well, you can determine that a planet has life-as-we-know-it if there's free oxygen in the atmosphere (you can have life without oxygen, but in our data sample of one, we've found that an element as reactive as oxygen is necessary for multi-cellular life). And that's something we can detect by photometry, especially with transiting planets like those found by Kepler. Any other conditions that exist on the planet friendly to life can be assumed or speculated on, but they'd be irrelevent anyway. Find free oxygen, and you've got a bang-on case for life elsewhere in the universe.

        Also, we've noticed in our own solar system that any planet of significant size (larger than Mars, for example) has a suitably strong magnetic field, so it's reasonable to expect that one exists for this planet.

  7. Grave

    so when is the elysium leaving for tanis, and where do i sign up? :)

  8. RachelG

    well the first thing is to point a radio telescope at it, surely?

    1. Grave

      depending on the distance it might fall within astroarcheology (which radioastronomy is a subset of)

      (listening to stuff that happened "distance" years ago)

      we don't have the tech to listen/communicate instantly yet (it will be probably something based on quantum entanglement)

    2. Ted Treen
      Meh

      Depends...

      ...upon how far away it is. If it's say 1,000 light years away, then all we would hear is any radio noise emitted from where it was 1,000 years ago. We would only see its star as it was - and where it was - 1,000 years ago.

      We would have to study it for some time and - if possible, calculate where it is now and point a radio telescope all along the track from its observed position (where it was 1,000 years ago) to where it is calculated to be and hope that in the intervening time any inhabitants had developed the technology to send radio signals in a recognisable way, and they would still be 1,000 years advanced from when they transmitted. Any reply would give an effective response time of 2,000 years between transmit & receive response assuming we pointed our response in the right direction.

      Of course, if it's a near neighbour, say 20 - 30 light years away, then the signal/response time might be only 40 - 60 years...

      1. James Loughner
        Headmaster

        Re: Depends...

        You do know that radio wave propagate at the speed of light don't you??? Da

        So light and radio will be 1000 years old when it get here. the true present position id immaterial

        1. Ted Treen
          Boffin

          Re: Depends...

          No it isn't immaterial:- If there were any intelligible signals received from a star system, our reply would need to be aimed at where that system would be at the time our reply reached it.

      2. NomNomNom

        Re: Depends...

        No point sending signals.

        If there was anyone over there who could understand, they'd be much older species than us and would already know we exist.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Alien

    I for one welcoe our space dolphin overlords!

    And I remind them that as a marketing professional with opposable thumbs, I am ideally placed to feed them fish in return for a little tail-walking.

    I'm still hopeful about the sexually curious amazon overlords too!

    1. Ted Treen
      Pint

      Re: I for one welcoe our space dolphin overlords!

      Marketeers have opposable thumbs?

  10. Simon Harris
    Alien

    Slightly frustrating article.

    So, we know the orbital radius of the planet, how long its year it, how big it is, the type of star and what we've decided to call the planet...

    but for the life of me, I can't see anywhere where it says which bleedin' star it's orbiting!

    Do you think there's something they're not tell us? Where's the tin-foil hat icon when you need it!

    1. Interceptor
      Alien

      Re: Slightly frustrating article.

      Would it help if I said it's extremely remote, and no human being will ever, ever see it?

      1. Richard 12 Silver badge

        Re: Slightly frustrating article.

        I hope you're wrong, and it's merely "no currently-living human being".

        Even then, if we pick up intelligible radio transmissions from Them it would have a pretty big impact on our culture anyway, regardless of what They actually said.

        (Probably the alien equivalent of Radio 1)

    2. Laurie
      Pint

      Re: Slightly frustrating article.

      It is irritating that it doesn't mention which star it orbits; however, as Kepler points at the same bit of the sky all the time, it must be located in a 115 square-degree region around where Cygnus, Lyra and Draco meet. So at least you can step outside with the Mk1 eyeball and look in the right place!

      Beer icon because with this weather, there's no point in getting a 'scope out - might as well stay in the pub...

  11. Rambler88
    Go

    I'm overweight as it is.

    What would the gravitation be like on a rocky planet with a radius 1.5 times Earth's?

    1. Crisp
      Boffin

      Re: I'm overweight as it is.

      Depends how dense it is I guess.

  12. Scott Broukell
    Megaphone

    Universal suburban neighborhood watch

    I am rather concerned that such proximity will have a negative affect on the current market value of our home planet. Given the vastness of space this potentially makes us semi-detatched, or, at the very least, end of terrace. We should be very careful during the initial phase of contact with anybody who is in at the time and see just how many shiny new space stations they have parked in orbit first. Perhaps if we asked to borrow some sugar it would help to encourage harmonious neighborly relations. Close the curtains now!

    1. hplasm
      Happy

      Re: Universal suburban neighborhood watch

      Odd- that's just what they said...

      1. Scott Broukell
        Happy

        My pink half of the worm hole

        Jolly good, I'm glad to hear it. Obviously it is a true clone of earth. On the plus side, I am looking forward to potentially more exotic jams and cakes at the annual Universal Neighborhood Watch jamboree - there's only so much that can be done with quince and greengage you know. But, hang on a minute, as it's an annual jamboree, is it still our annual, or theirs, or somewhere in the middle ? Would this mean we get more than one jamboree a year ? I'll email the vicar and see if there's a conflict with the steam rally. TTFN.

  13. Glenn Booth

    One of Slartibartfast's perchance?

    ...and will the fjords have crinkley edges?

  14. Tom Sparrow
    Boffin

    How far?

    So people (including me) keep asking how far this star is. Here's what I've found so far:

    According to the NASA database at http://exoplanetarchive.ipac.caltech.edu/cgi-bin/ExoTables/nph-exotbls?dataset=cumulative - rowID 1509, this star is at ra 293.260925 dec 44.868889

    I found this using Stellarium (a lovely little tool for the amateur, though I had to download the smaller magnitude maps to find it) at RA 19h 33m 2.62s / Dec 44 52m 7.8s but unfortunately it doesn't seem to have a name or a distance. Magnitude matches at 13.8 though, so I think it's the right one

    I leave this information here for anyone with more time to dig than me.

    1. Dave Bell
      Boffin

      Re: How far?

      The apparent Magnitude and the spectral type are enough to make a guess at the distance. This blighter is a really long way away, somewhere over 2000 light years according to the back of this here envelope.

      1. Tom Sparrow
        Unhappy

        Re: How far?

        Time was I could have made that calculation without an envelope, but no more, alas.

        Science aside, there's also something strangely satisfying about seeing it on the sky, even if it's a virtual sky (easier to zoom in on the right place as well then, plus you can draw pretty pictures over the constellations)

        1. Mister_C
          Pint

          Re: How far?

          So I don't need to get the holiday brochures then (and Scott Broukell can give the estate agentsa miss too).

          Beers all round to those who found it never the less

  15. bigphil9009

    I hope it's been sysprepped.

    Otherwise we're going to have all sorts of SSID issues if we ever meet up.

  16. Vladimir Plouzhnikov

    Oxygen-rich atmosphere

    Is not a pre-condition to life - it's a consequence of life.

    Earth did not have oxygen-rich atmosphere until life developed photosynthesis and started producing oxygen on large scale AND most of the exposed iron on the surface has been oxidised (about 1.7 billion years ago).

    I'd say if we ever find an oxygen-rich atmosphere around an exoplanet that would basically guarantee that there definitely is organic life on that planet.

  17. CCCP
    Unhappy

    Clone? With chavs and everything?

    Please tell it ain't so. It's depressing enough with one chav-infested planet.

    At least it'll be easy to tell, just look for the beige chequered pattern in the shadow the planet casts.

    Also, when we meet, we can recycle the same jokes like 'what do you call a chav in a box? innit'.

  18. Estariel
    Go

    How far means how long....

    The question of how far away it is matters not because of when the next GSV swings by to take us there, but of how soon until THEY GET HERE. We are fresh from the cave, but the probability is that they have been around rather longer.

    Supposing that the above guess of 2000 lightyears is correct, and that we on Earth started producing detectable radiation 150 years ago, our signals arrive there in 3862AD? A lightspeed return signal gets back to us in 5862AD. Of course, if they have figured out FTL then we might get a visit a bit sooner than that.....

  19. Purlieu

    "Hang on, I thought we were first?"

    I think that's what basically happened in '69 but we haven't been told yet

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re. "Hang on..."

    Apollo 18 ?

    Actually one theory doing the rounds is that the Roswell aliens originated from this system.

  21. rexjaxman
    Happy

    Distance to KOI-712-02 is 1010ly

    KOI-712 is the name of the star, aka KIC 9640976. The -02 indicates this is the second unconfirmed planet orbiting the star. KOI-712-01 was discovered in 2011. Johnstonesarchive/astro/extrasolarplanets/html gives the distance for the star at 1010 ly plus other information, after -01 was discovered in '11. The star also has the 2MASS designation as J19115789+4621247. Scroll down Johnstones list of planets to 1010 lys and you will find KOI-702.

    rex

  22. briesmith

    No Moon or Magnetism?

    Has this planet got what it takes? I ask because I understand that planets need a magnetic field or some other form of energy shield to stop all the inhabitants frying in the cosmic stream? And don't they need a gyroscopic moon to stop them flipping end over magnetic end?

    Finally, on a more serious note, I understand that Apple has already patented this planet and all its subsidiary technology but that the picture has been clouded by the discovery of a Samsung dolphin allegedly very closely related to the species claimed by Apple in its patent documentation. Apple's lawyers are on the case as I type.

This topic is closed for new posts.

Other stories you might like