Twin Planets!

Watching similar gestures performed by twins is always a natural thing and so surprising, isn't it?

Well, in my path of knowledge I perceived the twins' categories of humans, cities, rooms, crystals and many are existing to the universe's irrepressible bang but, turned nonplussed after hearing about "TWIN PLANETS ?"

In the process of comprehending this new vibrant concept, I passed by many unknown things of Kepler's small habitable zone planets happening in space regardless of the daily life on earth.

             

Rolling eyes to someone with identical body language or looking at any person with similar habits, many of us at some point, might have thought about the twinning of ourself! Didn't you? But ever thought of the "Doppelganger to Earth"?  Yes, it is known as Kepler-452b!

Meanwhile enjoying the double effect of Kepler-452b let me share you the particulars about Kepler space telescope. 

The centuries-old quest for other worlds like our Earth has been rejuvenated by the intense excitement and popular interest surrounding the discovery of hundreds of planets orbiting other stars. Now there is clear evidence for substantial numbers of three types of exoplanets; gas giants, hot-super-Earths in short-period orbits, and ice giants. 

The challenge now is to find terrestrial planets (similar to the size of the Earth) especially those in the habitable zone of their stars where liquid water might exist on the surface of the planet.

Being named after astronomer Johannes Kepler, the Kepler Mission is specifically designed to survey our region of the Milkyway galaxy to discover hundreds of Earth-size and smaller planets in or near the inhabitable zone.

With no long-overdue, let's travel to the twin planet of Earth. 

Kepler-452 is the name of a star in the constellation of Cygnus. It's a star that's similar to our own sun. It is about 1400 light-years away, which takes our spacecraft about 30M years to ride there.

The observation did so far about that Kepler-452 star is, it has only one planet orbiting around known as "Kepler-452b" also known as "Twin Planet" of our own Earth or "close Earth's cousin" or "Earth 2.0"! 

Kepler-452b, the first approximately Earth-sized planet to be found in the same spectral type(G2) as Sun-like star's (Kepler-452) the habitable zone-the orbital region where Earth-like planet could possess liquid water on its surface and thus possibly support life. 

So, is it another Earth?

 

We don't know whether life exists on this Kepler-452b, but we do know that it has some things in common with the Earth.

First, it takes 385 Earth days to complete its orbit around the star, which is only a bit longer than one year on Earth.

Second, astronomers say that the planet is in the "Goldilock zone", meaning the distance of the planet from its star is just correctly positioned, making it not too hot and not too cold for life to exist, just like Earth in our solar system. 

Third, the planet passes in front of its star once every orbit as seen from Earth, it blocks a small part of the star's light, so that it gets a bit fainter for a few hours. 

Thus by measuring the amount of the dip in light, scientists have worked out that Kepler-452b is about one-and-half times the size of the Earth. If it's made of rock (like our planet), then the mass of Kepler-452b must be about five times greater than Earth's. Therefore gravity here is twice as strong as on Earth. It's good news to the underweight people, no more worries, now on Kepler-452b, we weigh twice as much as we do here.  

Four, the planet's radius is 1.63 times that of Earth and no other celestial planets are found with relevant 1.50AU (Astronomical Units) to that of 1.0AU of the Earth so far by our astronomers.

Five, it orbits at a distance of 156.5 million km, the same as the distance between Earth and the Sun. 

The verity about the Kepler-452 star is, it's 20% brighter than the Sun and the resident planet Kepler-452b receives just 10% more solar energy than Earth. 

I can gen you by evidencing the curious point that, the star is 6 billion years old, 1.5 billion years older than Sun, and is in the stage of its life when its radius and luminosity being to increase that the planet may have undergone or will undergo greenhouse effect in which its surface water will boil away. 

Kepler-452b may not be exactly like the Earth, but it's probably the most Earth-like planet that astronomers have found so far.

To get more information about the exact Earth-like planet we may need to wait until our astronomers find the habitable zone like ours first, then proceed to reach that orbital region, research on the samples brought from that planet and thereby the progress involved later. 

Let's hope to see a terrestrial planet like ours soon, hence directing you back to our planet.