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A Planet 1,200 light-yrs away is a good Prospect for a Habitable World

An artist's conception of Kepler-62f, a planet in the 'habitable zone' of a star located about 1,200 light-years from Earth. Credit: NASA Ames/JPL-Caltech/T. Pyle

An artist’s conception of Kepler-62f, a planet in the ‘habitable zone’ of a star located about 1,200 light-years from Earth. Credit: NASA Ames/JPL-Caltech/T. Pyle

Combined climate, orbit models show Kepler-62f might be able to sustain life. The planet, in the direction of constellation Lyra, is ~40% larger than Earth. At that size, Kepler-62f is within the range of planets that are likely to be rocky and possibly could have oceans. NASA’s Kepler mission discovered the planetary system that includes Kepler-62f in 2013, and it identified Kepler-62f, the outermost of 5 planets orbiting a star that is smaller and cooler than the sun. but there was no composition, atmosphere or orbit data.

To determine whether the planet could sustain life, the team came up with possible scenarios about what it...

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