Scientists might have just found Earth’s icy, distant cousin a few hundred million light years away.
HD 137010 b is one of thousands of exoplanets, or planets that orbit other stars, and is potentially the first Earth-like one that also orbits a Sun-like star. Initially observed in 2017 with data from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and its Kepler Space Telescope, further details about HD 137010b came out this year.
Unlike many previously discovered exoplanets, it is also shockingly similar to Earth in terms of its size and the pattern of its orbit around its local star. Where it differs is its surface temperature: Whereas Earth tends to be, on average, closer to 60 degrees Fahrenheit, or 15.5 degrees Celsius, HD 137010 is a cool minus 90 degrees Fahrenheit, the equivalent of minus 68 degrees Celsius.
Read more at Northeastern Global News
Photo by NASA/JPL-Caltech/Keith Miller
