 Here's some cool news, we've got a new galactic neighbor! Astronomers have found a rocky, Earth-sized exoplanet that's super close to our solar system. Well, it's actually 39 light years away, but it's still the third closest transiting exoplanet we've ever found. This new world was discovered by an array of telescopes in Chile. Each night, the telescopes scan the night sky, measuring the brightness of various stars. This star and its exoplanet are particularly exciting for scientists, both because they're so close and because the star is a red dwarf. Red dwarfs are much smaller and fainter than stars like our sun, so we'll actually be able to see this planet and study it in greater detail. We may even be able to take an in-depth peek inside the planet's atmosphere. And figuring out the gases that surround a planet could tell us if any biological life forms are present on the surface below. Unfortunately, this exoplanet probably doesn't have any life on it. It's much closer to its star than we are to the sun, so the coolest it ever gets is about the same temperature as your kitchen oven on maximum heat. Still, astronomers rarely get to study the atmospheres of exoplanets, so figuring out the gases on this world will be really good practice.