Astronomers discover potential habitable exoplanet only 31 light-years from Earth

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Is Wolf 1069 b the Earth-like exoplanet we've been looking for?

An artist's depiction of Wolf 1069 b.
An artist's depiction of Wolf 1069 b. (Image credit: NASA/Ames Research Center/Daniel Rutter)

Although astronomers have discovered more than 5,200 exoplanets, less than 200 are rocky — so the discovery of a new terrestrial exoplanet is always exciting. 

In a new study, a team of 50 astronomers from around the world have confirmed the existence of exoplanet Wolf 1069 b, which orbits a red dwarf star, Wolf 1069, only 31 light-years from Earth. What makes this discovery particularly intriguing is that Wolf 1069 b is potentially a rocky world, at about 1.26 the mass of Earth and 1.08 the size. Wolf 1069 b also orbits in its star's habitable zone, making it a prime candidate for liquid water to potentially exist on its surface. 

"When we analyzed the data of the star Wolf 1069, we discovered a clear, low-amplitude signal of what appears to be a planet of roughly Earth mass," Diana Kossakowski, an astronomer at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Germany and lead author on the new research, said in a statement. "It orbits the star within 15.6 days at a distance equivalent to one-15th of the separation between the Earth and the sun." 

Related: The 10 most Earth-like exoplanet

For context, the planet Mercury, which is the closest planet to our sun, has an orbital period of 88 days. As a result, its surface temperatures reach as high as 800 degrees Fahrenheit (430 degrees Celsius). 

Unlike Mercury, Wolf 1069 b lies within its star habitable zone despite its much shorter orbital period of 15.6 days. This is because its star is a red dwarf star, meaning it's much smaller than our sun and Wolf 1069 b receives approximately 65% of the solar radiance that Earth receives. This improves its prospects for habitability, with relatively desirable surface temperatures that range between minus 139.27 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 95.15 degrees Celsius) and 55.13 F (12.85 C), with an average of minus 40.25 F (minus 40.14 C). 

One unique feature of Wolf 1069 b is that it is tidally locked to its parent star, meaning one side is always in daylight and the opposite side is always in darkness. (This attribute is shared by the moon in its orbit around Earth, as well as with most habitable exoplanets orbiting red dwarf stars.) While tidal locking means the planet doesn't have a day/night cycle like Earth, the researchers hope that its dayside could still boast habitable conditions. 

The remarkable discovery of Wolf 1069 b was made possible with the CARMENES (Calar Alto High-Resolution Search for M Dwarfs with Exoearths with Near-infrared and Optical Échelle Spectographs) instrument on the 11.5-foot (3.5-meter) telescope at the Calar Alto Observatory in Spain. 

"I want to highlight the incredible international team effort that was put together to discover such a fascinating planet," Kossakowski told Space.com in an email. "As the first author, I consider myself to be the 'project manager' of the planet discovery, where I get to bring together the brightest minds in the field to achieve something great. Everyone brings their own expertise to the table, and without them, the discovery would not be made possible. Astronomy is a collaborative effort — we are many with the same goal in mind of continuing the hunt for more exciting planets out there."

CARMENES can observe astronomical objects using two separate spectrographs in both the visual and near-infrared channels. The instrument discovered Wolf 1069 b using the exoplanet detection method known as radial velocity, which detects small wiggles in a star's location caused by a planet's gravity. 

Given its relatively short distance from Earth of 31 light-years, Wolf 1069 b is now the sixth closest Earth-mass habitable zone exoplanet; the others are, in order of increasing distance, Proxima Centauri b, GJ 1061 d, Teegarden's Star c, and GJ 1002 b and c. The researchers also note that global climate model climate simulations put Wolf 1069 b in a small group of exoplanets that are potential targets in the search for biosignatures, or chemical fingerprints of life. 

However, current astronomical research technologies can't conduct such searches yet.

"We'll probably have to wait another 10 years for this," Kossakowski said in the statement. "Though it's crucial we develop our facilities considering most of the closest potentially habitable worlds are detected via the RV [radial velocity] method only."

In the meantime, Kossakowski told Space.com in an email about two follow-up studies presently underway: The first is a more detailed examination of the preliminary results of the 3D global climate models that were presented in this paper, and the second is incorporating new RV data in hopes of better understanding the Wolf 1069 system overall.

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"We found that Wolf 1069 b is not a transiting planet, and for this reason, we won't be able to further characterize its atmosphere using the transmission spectroscopy method (as is being currently undergone for transiting planets using e.g. JWST [James Webb Space Telescope])," Kossakowski told Space.com in an email. "To characterize the atmospheres of RV-only detected planets is absolutely crucial, as many of these intriguing worlds that are closer to us are also RV-only detections. This will come in the next decade (or two or three) with newer technologies, so stay tuned — perhaps our grandchildren will experience us finding life on another planet."

The discovery is described in a paper published Friday (Feb. 3) in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics. 

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Laurence Tognetti
Laurence Tognetti
Contributing Writer

Laurence Tognetti is a six-year USAF Veteran and science writer who earned both a BSc and MSc from the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University. Laurence is extremely passionate about outer space and science communication, and is the author of “Outer Solar System Moons: Your Personal 3D Journey”. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram @ET_Exists.

5 Comments Comment from the forums
  • rod
    https://arxiv.org/abs/2301.02477, the reference is interesting reading. The exoplanet properties can be seen now at this site, http://exoplanet.eu/catalog/wolf_1069_b/
    The exoplanet atmosphere site presently shows nothing for the atmosphere or molecules for Wolf 1069 b, http://research.iac.es/proyecto/exoatmospheres/table.php
    Space.com published past reports on exoplanets that are in the habitable zone and perhaps could be earthlike.

    https://forums.space.com/threads/two-potentially-habitable-earth-like-worlds-orbit-a-star-in-our-cosmic-backyard.59280/
    /30172-six-most-earth-like-alien-planets.html, The 10 most Earth-like exoplanets

    Other sources document them too. https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2022arXiv221002484H/abstract
    https://arxiv.org/abs/2210.02484
    So far, efforts to define various exoplanets in their HZ around their parent stars, and demonstrate that they are like Earth, or even with life remain unconfirmed.
    Reply
  • rod
    I did some more who, what, when, where, how, and why digging into wolf 1069 b exoplanet. Here is what I found:

    Astronomers find rare Earth-mass rocky planet suitable for the search for signs of life, https://phys.org/news/2023-02-astronomers-rare-earth-mass-rocky-planet.html
    ref - The CARMENES search for exoplanets around M dwarfs. Wolf 1069 b: Earth-mass planet in the habitable zone of a nearby, very low-mass star, https://www.aanda.org/component/article?access=doi&doi=10.1051/0004-6361/202245322, 21-Dec-2022.

    My observation. From the phys.org report I note here about Wolf 1069 b.

    “According to the study, the surface of the dwarf star is relatively cool and thus appears orange-reddish. "As a result, the so-called habitable zone is shifted inwards," Kossakowski explains. Despite its close distance to the central star, the planet Wolf 1069 b therefore receives only about 65% of the incident radiant power of what Earth receives from the sun. These special conditions make planets around red dwarf stars like Wolf 1069 potentially friendly to life. In addition, they may all share a special property. Their rotation is probably tidally locked to the orbit of its host star. In other words, the star always faces the same side of the planet. So there is eternal day, while on the other side it is always night. This is also the reason why we always face the same side of the moon. If Wolf 1069 b is assumed to be a bare and rocky planet, the average temperature even on the side facing the star would be just minus 23 degrees Celsius. However, according to existing knowledge, it is quite possible that Wolf 1069 b has formed an atmosphere. Under this assumption its temperature could have increased to plus 13 degrees, as computer simulations with climate models show. Under these circumstances, water would remain liquid and life-friendly conditions could prevail, because life as we know it depends on water. An atmosphere is not only a precondition for the emergence of life from a climatic point of view. It would also protect Wolf 1069 b from high-energy electromagnetic radiation and particles that would destroy possible biomolecules. The radiation and particles either stem from interstellar space or from the central star. If the star's radiation is too intense, it can also strip off a planet's atmosphere, as it did for Mars. But as red dwarf, Wolf 1069 emits only relatively weak radiation. Thus, an atmosphere may have been preserved on the newly discovered planet. It is even possible that the planet has a magnetic field that protects it from charged stellar wind particles.”

    My note. This seems like the Faint Young Sun problem for Earth and Mars, efforts to show how such weak star radiation, about 65% of the Sun’s present value could allow a livable and habitable exoplanet. At some point in science, the evolutionary model interpretations must be replaced with *necessary demonstration* from nature as the heliocentric astronomers were required to do when debating the geocentric astronomers.
    Reply
  • Unclear Engineer
    I am wondering what those models show for the distribution of climate types on such tidally locked stars.

    I would expect water to evaporate on the lighted side and rise with warm gases, which would flow to the dark side of the planet at higher altitudes while colder gases form the dark side flowed counter-direction beneath it to replace the rising gases on the hot side.

    So, eventually, I would expect the water to all end-up as ice on the dark side, with a hot, dry dessert on the lighted side.

    What happens in the "twilight zone" between those 2 major areas seems to be where life might or might not have any chance to develop and evolve.

    And, considering how substantial climatic changes in Earth's enviroment seen to have pushed evolution towards more mobile and intelligent creatures, I am wondering if life on a tidally locked planet would evolve toward anything Earth-like.
    Reply
  • Helio
    Unclear Engineer said:
    I am wondering what those models show for the distribution of climate types on such tidally locked stars.

    I would expect water to evaporate on the lighted side and rise with warm gases, which would flow to the dark side of the planet at higher altitudes while colder gases form the dark side flowed counter-direction beneath it to replace the rising gases on the hot side.

    So, eventually, I would expect the water to all end-up as ice on the dark side, with a hot, dry dessert on the lighted side.

    What happens in the "twilight zone" between those 2 major areas seems to be where life might or might not have any chance to develop and evolve.

    And, considering how substantial climatic changes in Earth's enviroment seen to have pushed evolution towards more mobile and intelligent creatures, I am wondering if life on a tidally locked planet would evolve toward anything Earth-like.
    I think that is how these exo’s are viewed. There are those who think, however, that things like jet streams could add balance to both sides of the planet.

    I suspect tidal-lock effects may prove minor to the tantrum effects known for red dwarfs. Like small feisty dogs, these stars seem to all have bad behavior. But the studies are still few since these very dim stars are so hard to observe.
    Reply
  • rod
    For the record. Wolf 1069 b is orbiting a red dwarf star, about 0.167 solar mass. I used the exoplanet.eu site and looked at spectral type column. 5310 exoplanets and 3281 show null records for spectral type. Using MS ACCESS SQL query, I found 440 exoplanets that indicated red dwarf host stars for their parent stars, spectral type M. TRAPPIST-1 system and Wolf 1069 b report for this query too. Stellar mass ranges 0.0154 solar mass to 0.87 solar mass is a likely range to look at. Some show host star masses larger than 1 solar mass in the query return (so I ignore those) and eliminate exoplanets in the list where host star mass is a null record, that gives me 399 exoplanets moving around potential red dwarf stars using this method.

    That is a good red dwarf host exoplanet list to work from :) A trend I notice in reports like Wolf 1069 b et al. Planet x shows up in the news cycle as a hopeful earth-like planet or perhaps habitable and livable. After a period of time, planet x disappears from the reporting cycle :)

    Edit, *planet x disappears from the reporting cycle to the public* :)
    Reply