NASA's K2 mission finds more than 100 new planets

22:18, 20 July 2016

WASHINGTON, D.C. KAZINFORM More than 100 new exoplanets have been found by an international team of astronomers using the Kepler Space Telescope on its K2 mission, according to NASA. Out of the 104 newly confirmed planets, four are between 20% and 50% larger than Earth and have the potential to be rocky -- signs that they could potentially support life.

Astronomers have already ruled out two of them because they're too hot for life as we know it, but the other two -- K2-72c and K2-72e -- are in their star's favorable "habitable zone," where liquid water could pool on the surface and support life.

The single dwarf star these four planets are orbiting is cooler and less than half the size of our sun, which means that even though they are close to their star, they are still within the habitable zone.

Think of these exoplanets like Mercury, which is the smallest and closest planet to our sun, with a fast orbit -- 88 days, as opposed to a year on Earth.

A year on K2-72c, the closest to its star, equals 15 days on Earth and it is 10% warmer than our planet. K2-72e, which is a bit farther away, has a year comparable to 24 days on Earth is about 6% colder.

If you're zipping through space, these exoplanets can be found heading toward the Aquarius constellation, which is 181 light years away from us. While that sounds far away, it's close enough to be studied by space telescopes in the future.

Two months ago, Kepler confirmed the discovery of 1,284 new planets, with nine in the habitable zone. The new K2 discovery brings us to 3,368 confirmed exoplanets. So how do astronomers keep finding and confirming more planets?