Planet

Just how common are potentially habitable Earth-like planets? Researchers on a new study claim to have come up with the most accurate estimate yet – and they’re more common than you might think.

Data from the Juno probe found that Jupiter's core is less dense and more spread out than expected. Now, astronomers believe they have an answer – a huge ancient planet, with 10 times the mass of Earth, crashed into the gas giant in the early days of the solar system.

The Hubble Space Telescope has captured a detailed view of the largest planet in our solar system – the gas giant Jupiter. The portrait, which was captured on June 27, highlights the complex nature of Jupiter’s cloud surface, and showcases the gas giant’s most famous feature – the Great Red Spot.

In about five billion years’ time, the Sun will grow into a red giant, destroy the Earth and become a white dwarf star. But according to a new study, any aliens out there might still be able to pick up radio waves from Earth's planetary core – for up to a billion years.

New Hubble observations show that WASP-121b is a planet that’s so intensely hot it’s vaporizing heavy metals and venting them into space. As if that wasn’t enough, the poor planet is also being stretched into a football shape thanks to the strong gravity of its host star.

NASA’s TESS mission has been very busy lately, making many exoplanet discoveries. Now, the productive little satellite has made another important discovery – the closest super-Earth that’s potentially habitable.

A new study has used simulations to show that even Earth-like planets completely encased in ice could still have areas warm enough for life, muddying up the already-murky definition of habitable worlds.

Hurricanes and water go hand in hand. But researchers from Purdue University and MIT have now made a surprising discovery by tweaking a hurricane simulation – the storms can occur under much colder and drier conditions than previously thought, which may be common on other planets.

It’s been suggested in the past that life could hitch a ride on asteroids or comets to jump from world to world – a process known as panspermia. Now, a Harvard team has calculated just how likely that scenario would be throughout the Milky Way. In short: extremely.

Astronomers have discovered a weird star system that appears to be dimming completely at random, and none of the usual explanations seem to fit.

NASA astronomers have managed to probe the atmosphere of GJ 3470 b, a planet unlike any in our solar system. It marks the first time for this kind of world, and could be a step towards identifying potentially habitable planets.

Three new, roughly Earth-sized exoplanets have been found orbiting a nearby star. Named L 98-59b, c and d, the small worlds were spotted by NASA’s TESS, as part of a larger haul of data that finally brings the total tally past the milestone of 4,000 exoplanets discovered to date.