The American TESS and European CUPS telescopes observed a system consisting of six planets outside the solar system rotating at a very regular pace around their star, which constitutes an important discovery for understanding the formation of the solar system, according to a study published on Wednesday.
The six planets revolve around HD 110067, a bright star located about 100 light-years from our solar system in the constellation Coma, and can be seen from the Earth’s northern hemisphere.
Speaking to Agence France-Presse, Adrian Lelio from the University of Geneva, one of the main authors of the study published in the journal Nature, indicated that what was discovered is a very compact system that fits within the orbit of Mercury, the planet closest to the sun.
All of these planets are hot, and their diameter ranges between the size of the diameter of Earth and the diameter of Neptune. Its components are similar to those of Neptune. The astrophysicist says that it is a “rocky body covered with a thick envelope of gas.”
None of these “mini-Neptunes” are located in a habitable zone, that is, at a good distance that makes the presence of liquid water possible on them, because this component is essential for the existence of life on planets.
The six observed planets have notable features: their orbital periods, that is, the time they take to orbit their star, are highly synchronized, something that has not been observed in a group of more than 5,000 planets outside the solar system since the discovery of the first in 1995.
The discovery began in 2020 when NASA’s TESS space telescope observed the star HD 110067, a star similar in size to our sun.
