spacetoday.net: Three planets found in habitable zone of star

Posted: Thu, Jun 27, 2013, 8:19 AM ET (1219 GMT)
Gliese 667C illustration (ESO)

Astronomers announced this week that a nearby star has three "super-Earth" planets in its habitable zone, raising prospects that such planets are commonplace. A team of astronomers revisited earlier observations of the star Gliese 667C, which indicated the presence of three planets in orbit around it, one in the zone where water could exist on its surface in liquid form. Astronomers combined new observations from several telescopes to that existing data to conclude that the star has at least six planets, three of which are in its habitable zone. Those three planets are so-called super-Earths, more massive than the Earth but less massive than Uranus or Neptune. The finding suggests that potentially habitable planets may be relatively common.