Who needs to flee to Canada when there are 24 planets more suitable for life than planet Earth?
Astronomers have discovered two dozen planets, all more than 100 light-years away, that are perfectly capable of sustaining human life as 2020 continues to rear its ugly head in our end of space.
These “super-habitable” worlds are older, bigger, warmer and have more moisture than Earth, according to the study, led by Washington State University geobiologist Dirk Schulze-Makuch and
published in the journal Astrobiology.
There’s no confirmation that life exists on these planets, but the study used those characteristics to search for super-habitable potentials across 4,500 exoplanets, simply defined as planets that orbit stars outside of our own solar system.
These faraway worlds could become subjects of future study, thanks to upcoming advanced telescopes, including NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope.
“With the next space telescopes coming up, we will get more information, so it is important to select some targets,” said Schulze-Makuch
in a statement. “We have to focus on certain planets that have the most promising conditions for complex life. However, we have to be careful to not get stuck looking for a second Earth, because there could be planets that might be more suitable for life than ours.”
Researchers identified these planets based on a list of specific criteria. Among them, the planets’ presence in the host star’s “goldilocks zone,” or the habitable orbit around a star where liquid water can exist thanks to the right temperature. Not only does the right surface temperature matter for the existence of water, but a surface temperature about 41 degrees warmer than that of Earth would be more suitable for life, thanks to the combination of higher temperatures and the presence of moisture.
Also, when it comes to planets, bigger is better. A planet that’s even 10% larger than Earth means it has more habitable land. Plus, one that has even 1.5 times our planet’s mass means it can keep its interior heating longer through radioactive decay, and would also have even stronger gravity to sustain an atmosphere (and hold down moisture) for a longer period of time.
None of the 24 spheres met every single criteria for super-habitable planets, but one of them met three, automatically making it more comfortable than planet Earth — with ostensibly much less drama. That planet, nicknamed KOI 5715.01, is 5.5 billion years old and 1.8 times larger than Earth. Its average temperature is a crisp 53.3 degrees and it’s just 2,964 light-years away from us.
