The shifts, which astronomers call "wobbles,” are caused by the gravitational tugging of a planet roughly 1. We won’t have a clue about life until we take the next step, which is direct imaging of the planet allowing us to study the atmosphere ..4 million miles away. The international team of 31 scientists that announced the discovery did not actually see the planet.Proxima b is not just within the habitable zone of its star, but also the closest possible home for life outside of our solar system, researchers said. And it is a mere 4. They deduced its existence indirectly, using telescopes to spot and precisely calculate the gravitational pull on the star by a possible orbiting body – a tried-and-true method of planet-hunting.22 light-years from Earth, or nearly 40 trillion kilometres. The planet orbits Proxima Centauri every 11. Researchers have confirmed the existence of a rocky planet named Proxima b orbiting Proxima Centauri, the closest star to our sun, according to a new study. But they needed additional observations, using more precise instruments, to make a definitive call.2 Earth days and is five per cent the distance from its much-cooler red dwarf star as we are from our sun.. We know now there is at least one planet with some characteristics similar to the Earth,” said Pete

Worden, a former top Nasa manager, who was speaking at wholesale slide bearings a European Southern Observatory webcast news conference to announce the find."Any talk about life on Proxima b is pure speculation. Based on the timing of wobbles, scientists determined that the planet circles its host star in just 11 days, compared to Earth’s 365-day orbit around the sun. "Chances are good that it’s a viable, Earth-like planet today,” said astronomer Pedro Amado, with the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía in Granada, Spain. but that is realistically 20 years away,” Mr Butler said.”"This is the best case we have of a potentially habitable planet and none will ever be found nearer than this,” said Paul Butler, co-author of the study. An artist’s impression of Proxima b The search for life outside our solar system just got a whole lot closer. He said the planet is "more or less what we have on Earth.The search for life outside our solar system just got a whole lot closer.Astronomers got their first hint of a planet circling the sun’s small dim neighbour star in 2013. This puts it in the not-too-hot, not-too-cold "Goldilocks Zone” where liquid water is possible, if the planet has an atmosphere."The key question of our initiative was whether there were potentially life-bearing planets orbiting these stars. However, Proxima Centauri is so much smaller and dimmer than the sun that its planet’s orbit is suitably positioned for liquid water despite being just 4."We hit the jackpot here,” said Guillem Anglada-Escude , an astrophysicist at the Queen Mary University of London and lead author of the study published in journal Nature.3 times the size of Earth on the parent star.That puts the planet far closer to its parent star than Earth orbits the sun.

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