A new planet discovered by NASA

NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) has discovered a new planet recently . It is between the sizes of Mars and Earth and orbits a nearby star. It has been named L 98-59b.

One of TESS’s goals is to build a catalogue of small, rocky planets on short orbits around very bright, nearby stars for atmospheric study.

Apart from L 98-59b, two other worlds orbit the same star. While all three planets’ sizes are known.

“The discovery has a great engineering and scientific accomplishment for TESS. For atmospheric studies of small planets,it is needed to short orbits around bright stars, but such planets are difficult to detect. This system has the potential for fascinating future studies,”.

L 98-59b is around 80% Earth’s size. The two other worlds in the system, L 98-59c and L 98-59d, are respectively around 1.4 and 1.6 times Earth’s size. Their host star, L 98-59, is about one-third the mass of the Sun and lies about 35 light-years away. While L 98-59b is a record for TESS, even smaller planets have been discovered in data collection NASA’s Kepler satellite.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Sattiriya Dance

The Chola Period marks a distinct and significant period in the art and architecture of India

Interior of the Earth