Newly Found Planet Orbiting Barnard’s Star Only 6 Light Years from Earth

Barnard’s star, one of the Sun’s closest neighbors, appears to have at least one planet orbiting around it, and possibly three more that require further confirmation.

Astronomers have been searching for planets around Barnard’s star, 5.96 light-years away, since the 1960s. Barnard’s star is the next closest star to us after the three stars in the Alpha Centauri star system.

In 2018, researchers claimed to have discovered a planet at least three times the size of Earth called Barnard Star B, but subsequent analysis revealed that the apparent planet’s signal was actually a larger-than-expected star. Turns out it was caused by activity. .

now, Jonay González Hernández Researchers at the Canary Islands Institute of Astrophysics have announced the discovery of a new Barnard star b, which has about 40 percent the mass of Earth.

The planet is much closer to its star than any other planet in our solar system, completing an orbit in just over three Earth days. This also means that its surface temperature is around 125°C (257°F), too hot for liquid water or life to exist.

Using an instrument called Espresso on the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope in Chile, González Hernández and his team observed tiny wobbles in Barnard’s star’s position caused by the orbiting planet’s gravity. I discovered this star.

They also found evidence of three more planets orbiting the star. However, the signal wasn’t strong enough to be certain, so more observations will be needed to confirm that.

“These detections are very tricky and always difficult because there is stellar activity, the magnetic field of the star that rotates with the star,” he says. Rodrigo Fernando Diaz at the National University of San Martin, Argentina. González Hernández and his team have thoroughly checked whether the observations are from a planet, but there could always be “unknown unknowns,” Fernando Díaz said. says. To really confirm this, he says, data from other telescopes is needed, which could take years of observations.