Kepler-1649c — Playing it a Little too Close for Comfort - Astronomy News with The Cosmic Companion

Is the exoplanet Kepler 1649c a new Earth? It's warm, has just the right gravity, and it also holds a deadly secret.

Meet exoplanet Kepler-1649c — it’s the same size as Earth, and its distance from its sun is just right for life — and that may NOT be a good thing.

An artist’s impression of a landscape on Kepler 1649c. Image credit: NASA/Ames Research Center/Daniel Rutter

By James Maynard

Sitting roughly 300 light years from Earth, the exoplanet Kepler-1649c orbits a small, red star. Although this star does not give off much heat, the planet huddles close to it, like a camper close to an inadequate fire on a chilly night.

This close to its parent star, Kepler-1649c is in the habitable zone of its solar system, where bodies of water are more likely to form. With oceans, rivers and seas, the possibility of life arising on the alien world increases.

Kepler-1649c receives roughly three-quarters as much radiation as the Earth encounters in our own solar system. Temperatures on this exoplanet— as well as the types of radiation that would be received on its surface — would depend, in part, on any atmosphere and/or magnetic field of that distant exoplanet, about which little is known.

Kepler-1649c is just six percent larger than Earth, making it seem even a little more like our home planet.

Read more: https://bit.ly/Kepler-1949c