First atmosphere found on Earth-like planet in habitable zone of distant star
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Researchers detected helium in the atmosphere of rocky planet LHS 1140b, 48 light-years away.
Astronomers at Harvard found the first atmosphere around LHS 1140b, an Earth-like planet in the habitable zone of a red dwarf star 48 light-years away. The detected gas is helium, which alone cannot support life, but other gases may exist lower in the atmosphere. The planet joins a handful of rocky worlds in the "Goldilocks zone," but no previous one had a confirmed atmosphere. The discovery, published in Science, is called "a big deal" by lead author Collin Cherubim, though they have not found life.
What commenters are saying
Commenters split on interstellar travel feasibility. Many argued that 48 light-years is effectively unreachable, citing the immense difficulty of accelerating probes to relativistic speeds even with nuclear or laser-sail propulsion, and that dust grains would destroy any craft. Others noted realism that humans likely won't visit other star systems, though generation ships or probes remain theoretically possible.
A minority pointed to known concepts like Project Daedalus or Orion for ~0.12c travel, but conceded deceleration and cost remain prohibitive. Some mentioned relativistic time dilation as a potential workaround for human travel, noting the ship's crew could survive the trip while Earth ages centuries.