ESA’s PLATO mission tagged posts

Could the ESA’s PLATO Mission find Earth 2.0?

Artist’s impression of the ESA’s PLATO mission. Credit: ESA/ATG medialab

Currently, 5,788 exoplanets have been confirmed in 4,326 star systems, while thousands more candidates await confirmation. So far, the vast majority of these planets have been gas giants (3,826) or Super-Earths (1,735), while only 210 have been “Earth-like”—meaning rocky planets similar in size and mass to Earth.

What’s more, the majority of these planets have been discovered orbiting within M-type (red dwarf) star systems, while only a few have been found orbiting sun-like stars. Nevertheless, no Earth-like planets orbiting within a sun-like star’s habitable zone (HZ) have been discovered so far.

This is largely due to the limitations of existing observatories, which have been unable to resolve Earth-size...

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