Astronomers discover two 'super-Earths' orbiting nearby star
An international team of astronomers reports the discovery of two new "super-Earth" exoplanets orbiting a nearby late-type M dwarf star. The newfound alien worlds, designated LP 890-9 b and LP 890-9 c, are slightly larger than the Earth. The finding has been published in Astronomy & Astrophysics. "Super-Earths" are planets more massive than Earth but not exceeding the mass of Neptune. Although the term "super-Earth" refers only to the mass of the planet, it is also used by astronomers to describe planets bigger than Earth but smaller than the so-called "mini-Neptunes" (with a radius between two to four Earth radii). Now, astronomers led by Laetitia Delrez of the University of Liège in Belgium, have discovered two new planets of the super-Earth class. They observed LP 890-9 a nearby M dwarf star of M6V spectral type, using NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). This led to the discovery of the inner planet, which received de...