Watch CBS News

Planetary Discovery Suggests Earth Not So Unique

SANTA CRUZ (KCBS) - The discovery of a planet similar to our own after a mere decade of searching through nine star systems suggests the Earth may not be so special after all, said a Northern California scientist who helped find the new planet.

"The fact that this thing happened so quickly and it's so nearby that you're going to start to see a lot of these over the next 10 years," said UC Santa Cruz astronomer Steven Vogt.

KCBS Matt Bigler Reporting:

The exoplanet in the constellation Libra is one of the first to be discovered the in what Vogt called "the Goldilocks zone" around a star, an orbit that's neither too hot nor too cold.

The planet does not spin the way Earth does, however, so one side is always hot and the other always cold. And the specialized telescopes in Hawaii that detected the planet have yet to turn up evidence of water.

Vogt said getting an eventual first-hand look is feasible since at 20 light years, "it's very nearby" on an astronomical scale. It would take a spaceship about 200 years to reach it.

(© 2010 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

View CBS News In
CBS News App Open
Chrome Safari Continue
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.