And please don't call it "another Earth"

News arrived last week that the nearest neighbor to our Sun, the red dwarf Proxima Centauri, is orbited by a rocky planet that might have liquid water. But Tabitha M. Powledge warns that you might not like to live there: "Proxima b is semi-sorta Earth size, minimum 1.3 Earth’s mass, and probably rocky like Earth. But in almost every other way, Proxima b cannot reasonably be called Earthlike. For example, the planet’s year is only a little more than 11 Earth days long."

August 27, 2016

ADVERTISEMENT
BWF Climate Change and Human Health Seed Grants

ADVERTISEMENT
EurekAlert! Travel Awards

ADVERTISEMENT
Eric and Wendy Schmidt Awards for Excellence in Science Communications