Wikipedia

Kepler-186f is Earth’s “slightly bigger and older cousin.”

Thanks to NASA there are a few facts we know about the most recently discovered planet, Kepler-186f. Kepler-186f is a Goldilocks planet which is a planet that falls within a star’s habitable zone. The name is derived from the children’s story, Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Much like Goldilocks and her dilemma of too hot and too cold, these planets are neither too close nor too far from the closest star allowing for the idea of water to be present on the surface, thus creating an environment with the potential to sustain life.

Wikipedia

Kepler-186f is actually very close to the size of our home planet.

Kepler-186f is approximately 500 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cygnus. This new and exciting discovery gets even better considering the planet is the smallest Goldilocks planet found, roughly the same size as earth. NASA claims that the planet is about 1.37 times that of Earth. Things are looking good, but because we do not know what Kepler-186f’s atmosphere is like, it’s hard to say whether the planet offers an environment necessary to sustain life forms.

Kepler-186f is approximately 5 percent farther away from its sun/star (Kepler-452) than it is from our sun.

According to an article published on the Huffington post the planet’s host star, named Kepler-452, appears to be 1.5 billion years older than our sun, at 6 billion years old. It has close to the same temperature as our sun and is about 20 percent brighter and 10 percent larger in diameter.

Only time will tell if this newly discovered planet may be the answer to the ongoing search for an alternate location to inhabit.

Do you think we will find a planet with life? What are your thoughts about Kepler-186f?

Additional Image: PHL

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