exoplanet, habitable, space, ESO, LHS 1140
This planet is located in the liquid water habitable zone surrounding its host star, a small, faint red star named LHS 1140. The planet weighs about 6.6 times the mass of Earth and is shown passing in front of LHS 1140. Depicted in blue is the atmosphere the planet may have retained.ESO/ M. Weiss/CfA

Astronomers have revealed that those Earth-like planets that orbit a cool and small star are potentially more habitable and can possess alien life.

Also Read: Habitable planets will mostly be covered in water, say researchers

A planet dubbed LHS 1140b, which is six times as massive as Earth, orbits a red-dwarf star called LHS 1140. This planet, which is also referred to as Super-Earth, is present in the habitable Goldilocks zone which doesn't have extreme temperatures, at a distance of 40 lightyears away.

Around 3,500 exoplanets have been discovered so far by the researchers and the number is still growing. NASA had spotted a total of 715 new planets with the help of the Kepler telescope in 2014. The red dwarf star that this newly spotted planet closely orbits is less luminous, which becomes fairly noticeable when viewed with the help of telescopes.

"The star is close, and small, and quiet, in terms of flares and activity," said Dr Jason A Dittman, the lead author of the study, as reported by Buzzfeed News.

The planet LHS 1140b is has all the potential characters required to be habitable. The researchers will be analysing the planet with the help of the prevailing telescopes, they will also utilise Hubble Space Telescope along with various ground-based telescopes to examine the exoplanet better.

exoplanet, habitable, space, ESO, LHS 1140, red dwarf star,
This chart shows the location of the faint red star LHS 1140 in the faint constellation of Cetus (The Sea Monster). This star is orbited by a super-Earth exoplanet called LHS 1140b, which may be best place to look for signs of life beyond the Solar System. The star is too faint to be seen in a small telescope.ESO/IAU and Sky & Telescope

"The present conditions of the red dwarf are particularly favourable – LHS 1140 spins more slowly and emits less high-energy radiation than other similar low-mass stars," said Dr Nicola Astudillo-Defru of Geneva Observatory in Switzerland, as per an ESO statement.

Dr Dittman stated that more details about LHS 1140b will be accumulated using James Webb Space Telescope and the Giant Magellan Telescope which would be launched in 2018.

exoplanet, habitable, space, ESO, LHS 1140, red dwarf star,
This artist's impression shows the exoplanet LHS 1140b, which orbits a red dwarf star 40 light-years from Earth and may be the new holder of the title "best place to look for signs of life beyond the Solar System". Using ESO's HARPS instrument at La Silla, and other telescopes around the world, an international team of astronomers discovered this super-Earth orbiting in the habitable zone around the faint star LHS 1140. This world is a little larger and much more massive than the Earth and has likely retained most of its atmosphere.ESO/spaceengine.org

"This is the most exciting exoplanet I've seen in the past decade," said lead author Jason Dittmann of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (Cambridge, USA).

"We could hardly hope for a better target to perform one of the biggest quests in science — searching for evidence of life beyond Earth."

Atmospheres of exoplanets will be closely examined with the help of ESO's Extremely Large Telescope in the future. Researchers will make detailed surveillances of these planets and LHS 1140b is believed to be the most habitable exoplanet discovered by the astronomers so far.

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