Star's seven Earth-sized worlds set record

[Robert]

Astronomers have detected a record seven Earth-sized planets orbiting a single star.

The researchers say that all seven could potentially support liquid water on the surface, depending on the other properties of those planets.

But only three are within the conventional "habitable" zone where life is considered a possibility.

The compact system of exoplanets orbits Trappist-1, a low-mass, cool star located 40 light-years away from Earth.

40 light years.
That's just up the road in astronomical terms but still far enough away that we'll probably never get anywhere near it, even with an unmanned probe.

Rough back of a fag packet guestimate:
Even if Voyager 1 (still the fastest-over-a-long-distance thing we've ever built), which has already left the solar system* after travelling for several decades, was heading that way (it isn't), it would take almost another 1,000,000 (one meeeEEEeeelion) years to get there.

Cool science though. More research needed, etc...

*for a given definition of the solar system.

 

[Robert]

More on this and the Guardian calling it 'nearby'.
Still, I suppose it's all relative.

 

[Robert]

El reg reckons it's only -
44 million years away by jet plane

Obligatory artist's impression:

And NASA "travel poster":

 

[redrumloa]

El reg reckons it's only -
44 million years away by jet plane

Obligatory artist's impression:

And NASA "travel poster":

Yeah no. We don't know what's at the bottom of our oceans nor the mechanisms that control climate, yet we know what other worlds exist in galaxies far, far away and what they look like? Nope! ;-)

 

[Robert]

Rough back of a fag packet guestimate:
.....

Thankfully, the kindly folks at Space.com could be arsed to do a slightly more thorough calculation:

Voyager 1
Voyager 1, Earth's most distant spacecraft, left the solar system and entered interstellar space in 2012. According to NASA, it is currently speeding away at 38,200 mph. For Voyager 1 to get to TRAPPIST-1, it would take the spacecraft 685,000 years.

But Voyager 1 isn't going there anytime soon, or ever. Instead, the spacecraft is heading for a different star, AC +79 3888, which lies 17.6 light-years from Earth. It will fly within 1.7 light-years of this star in about 40,000 years.