Do aliens live on super-Earth L 98-59 f? Discovery kicks up talk about 'Goldilocks zone'

A newly-found exoplanet in a “habitable zone” may hold water — and maybe even life.

Nature Astronomy and Wired Science reported on the discovery of the exoplanet L 98-59 f as part of the L 98-59 system around a “red dwarf” star.

Astronomers – and alien hunters – at the University of Montreal discovered the brand-new potentially habitable “exoplanet”, and found that L 98-59 f is a “non-transiting planet” with about 2.8 times Earth’s mass.

Here’s the lowdown on this new potential “Super Earth”:

35 light-years: That’s the distance traveled by light in 35 years.

In kilometre terms, that’s approximately 331 trillion km (3.31×1014 km), as light travels about 9.46 trillion in one year (or about 301,000 km per second). 

L 98-59 f, an "exoplanet", lives in what’s called the star’s "habitable", temperate or "Goldilocks zone" — that’s the sweet spot where temperatures could allow liquid water to exist on its surface, which is a huge deal when thinking about potential life.

L 98-59 f orbits every 23 days within its star’s habitable zone, where liquid water could potentially exist if the planet has a suitable atmosphere. 

By comparison, the Earth takes approximately 365.25 days to complete one full orbit around the Sun.

An exoplanet is any planet beyond our solar system. Most of them orbit other stars. Nasa has confirmed nearly 6,000 exoplanets, out of the billions that astronomers believe exist.

There are also some free-floating exoplanets, called “rogue planets”, which are untethered to any star. 

Yes. This discovery brings the known count to five planets in this system. What’s amazing is all five orbit close to their red dwarf star, all inside or near the habitable zone — a rare planetary lineup.

Unlike many exoplanets, L 98-59 f doesn’t transit in front of its host star from our point of view, so it doesn’t create a “mini-eclipse” we can easily spot (using telescopes on or near Earth).

Instead, astronomers spotted it by tracking tiny wobbles in the star’s motion caused by the planet’s gravitational tug — a refined detective method using super-sensitive instruments.

The planet's discovery was confirmed through precise measurements of the star's motion caused by the gravitational pull of orbiting planets, using advanced instruments.

The discovery relied on two powerful planet-hunting tools: the HARPS spectrograph on the European Southern Observatory’s telescope and the ESPRESSO spectrograph at ESO’s Very Large Telescope in Chile.

It’s a “super-Earth” about 2.8 times the mass of Earth with an orbit of about 23 days around its star. 

Importantly, it receives roughly the same amount of energy from its red dwarf star as Earth does from the Sun — making it an excellent candidate for a temperate climate and liquid water if conditions are right.

The system is a real cosmic treasure trove:

All have nearly circular orbits, which is good news for future studies.

The L 98-59 system now has five confirmed planets, all small and rocky, residing in or near the habitable zone.

The exoplanet "Goldilocks" zone, also known as the habitable zone, is the region around a star where conditions are just right—not too hot and not too cold — for liquid water to exist on the surface of an orbiting planet.

This zone is crucial because liquid water is considered essential for life as we know it.

The James Webb Space Telescope will be used to attempt a direct image of this fascinating world and study its atmosphere, taking us closer to answering whether it could support life.

The only other known system with a similar number of habitable zone planets is TRAPPIST-1, about 39 light-years away, which hosts seven rocky planets, three of which are in its habitable zone.

Red dwarfs are small, cool stars that live incredibly long lives, often much longer than our Sun — meaning their planets could have a long time for life to potentially develop.

This discovery makes L 98-59 a “fascinating” system and a high-priority target for future exploration in the quest to find potentially habitable worlds beyond our solar system, according to Nasa.