A newly discovered, roughly Earth-Sized planet is orbiting our nearest star “neighbour”. The Planet is at the right distance from the star to have liquid water to exist on the surface! This planet, Proxima b, circles Proxima Centauri, AKA Alpha Centauri. Proxima B is about 1.3X the mass of the earth, and orbits 11 times closer than mercury orbits our sun. it takes about 11.2 days for a Proxima b “Year.” Its orbit is at 7,255,600 km, or about 0.05 AU. Proxima b orbits a red dwarf star. this probably means that one side is facing the sun ALL THE TIME. so, that side will probably be an oven, and the other side is a freezer. but in between those two, life might form!
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