November 8, 2012 The latest in a long string of recent exoplanet
discoveries could be the most exciting one yet: A planet called
HD 40307g, roughly 44 light years away, appears to be the most
likely candidate to harbor life of any exoplanet we’ve
discovered to date. Larger than Earth, but smaller than a gas
giant, the planet seems to be in the “goldilocks” zone of its
star system, the region with the right balance of heat and cold
to potentially allow for liquid water. To be clear, the
discovery (described in a paper published yesterday in the
journal Astronomy and Astrophysics), like nearly all other
exoplanet discoveries, is indirect and theoretical. Rather than
observing the planet with a telescope, a team of astronomers led
by Mikko Tuomi of the UK’s University of Hertfordshire analyzed
existing public data produced by the European Southern
Observatory and realized it contained hints of something rather
interesting. While scientists had previously looked at the star
HD 40307 and found it was orbited by th