Scientists just found four small planets not too far from us, and they might be perfect for future space travelers. These exoplanets are the right size, possibly have the right conditions, and they’re just sitting out there, waiting to be explored. It’s like the universe dropped a hint: “Hey humans, pack your bags!” Colonization might sound like sci-fi, but these planets could be real candidates someday. Who knows — they might be our second homes in the future. Space just got a whole lot more exciting! Credit:
New Supercomputer Simulation Sheds Light on Moon’s Origin: By NASA, https://images.nasa.gov/details-ARC-20221004-AAV3443-MoonOrigin-Social-NASAWeb-1080p
Debris Disks Generate Spirals: By NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/12807/
TESS, Spitzer Missions Discover a Unique Young World: By NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/13648/
HIRMES: SOFIA's latest high-resolution Mid-infrared Spectrometer: By NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/12673/
Beta Pictoris: Icy Debris Suggests 'Shepherd' Planet: By NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/11499/
JWST Science Simulations: Solar System Birth: By NCSA, NASA, A. Boley, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/10662/
SDO's Ultra-high Definition View of 2012 Venus Transit: By NASA, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/10996/
CC BY 4.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ :
Alpha Centauri from Paranal: By John Colosimo/ESO, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Alpha_Centauri_from_Paranal.jpg
MAROON-X during installation: By International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/J. Bean, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MAROON-X_during_installation_(noirlab2110f).jpg
MAROON-X at Gemini North: By International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/J. Bean, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MAROON-X_at_Gemini_North_(noirlab2510b).jpg
A Taste of ESPRESSO: By ESO/M. Zamani, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:A_Taste_of_ESPRESSO.jpg
Eso1436a: By ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eso1436a.tif
Protoplanetary Disk XUE 1: By ESO/L. Calçada, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Protoplanetary_Disk_XUE_1_(Artist_Concept)_(2023-152).jpg
CC BY-SA 4.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ :
Ymir-full: By Brett Gladman/Canadian Astronomy Data Centre, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ymir-full.gif
Orion Watches over Paranal: By ESO/Y. Beletsky, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Orion_Watches_over_Paranal_-_potw2009a.jpg
Shield of the University of Central Lancashire: By ET72, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Shield_of_the_University_of_Central_Lancashire.svg
CC BY 3.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/:
GW Orionis: By Jiaqing Bi et al., https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:GW_Orionis_2.jpg
HR 8799 Orbiting Exoplanets: By Jason Wang, et al, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HR_8799_Orbiting_Exoplanets.gif
Animation is created by Bright Side.
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For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me
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This video is made for entertainment purposes. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, safety and reliability. Any action you take upon the information in this video is strictly at your own risk, and we will not be liable for any damages or losses. It is the viewer's responsibility to use judgement, care and precaution if you plan to replicate.
New Supercomputer Simulation Sheds Light on Moon’s Origin: By NASA, https://images.nasa.gov/details-ARC-20221004-AAV3443-MoonOrigin-Social-NASAWeb-1080p
Debris Disks Generate Spirals: By NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/12807/
TESS, Spitzer Missions Discover a Unique Young World: By NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/13648/
HIRMES: SOFIA's latest high-resolution Mid-infrared Spectrometer: By NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/12673/
Beta Pictoris: Icy Debris Suggests 'Shepherd' Planet: By NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/11499/
JWST Science Simulations: Solar System Birth: By NCSA, NASA, A. Boley, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/10662/
SDO's Ultra-high Definition View of 2012 Venus Transit: By NASA, https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/10996/
CC BY 4.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ :
Alpha Centauri from Paranal: By John Colosimo/ESO, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Alpha_Centauri_from_Paranal.jpg
MAROON-X during installation: By International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/J. Bean, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MAROON-X_during_installation_(noirlab2110f).jpg
MAROON-X at Gemini North: By International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/J. Bean, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MAROON-X_at_Gemini_North_(noirlab2510b).jpg
A Taste of ESPRESSO: By ESO/M. Zamani, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:A_Taste_of_ESPRESSO.jpg
Eso1436a: By ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eso1436a.tif
Protoplanetary Disk XUE 1: By ESO/L. Calçada, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Protoplanetary_Disk_XUE_1_(Artist_Concept)_(2023-152).jpg
CC BY-SA 4.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ :
Ymir-full: By Brett Gladman/Canadian Astronomy Data Centre, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ymir-full.gif
Orion Watches over Paranal: By ESO/Y. Beletsky, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Orion_Watches_over_Paranal_-_potw2009a.jpg
Shield of the University of Central Lancashire: By ET72, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Shield_of_the_University_of_Central_Lancashire.svg
CC BY 3.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/:
GW Orionis: By Jiaqing Bi et al., https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:GW_Orionis_2.jpg
HR 8799 Orbiting Exoplanets: By Jason Wang, et al, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HR_8799_Orbiting_Exoplanets.gif
Animation is created by Bright Side.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Music from TheSoul Sound: https://thesoul-sound.com/
Check our Bright Side podcast on Spotify and leave a positive review! https://open.spotify.com/show/0hUkPxD34jRLrMrJux4VxV
Subscribe to Bright Side: https://goo.gl/rQTJZz
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Our Social Media:
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brightside.official
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https://www.shutterstock.com
https://www.eastnews.ru
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For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me
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This video is made for entertainment purposes. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, safety and reliability. Any action you take upon the information in this video is strictly at your own risk, and we will not be liable for any damages or losses. It is the viewer's responsibility to use judgement, care and precaution if you plan to replicate.
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FunTranscript
00:00Right now, four tiny Earth-like planets are chilling around one of the closest star systems to us.
00:08We're talking second closest.
00:10These little rocky worlds are each about 20 to 30% the mass of Earth.
00:15So not quite Earth 2.0, but still pretty solid.
00:20Will one of them become our new home one day?
00:23Well, all of them are pretty close, so future humans might actually visit them someday.
00:28Not like next year or anything, but we could potentially send missions there.
00:33Don't expect any extraterrestrial neighbors, though.
00:38Those planets probably aren't home to life, or at least not anything we'd recognize.
00:43Let's take a look at them.
00:46The planets are called Bernard B, C, D, and E.
00:54How creative, huh?
00:55Well, the innermost has a mass of 26% of Earth.
01:00The second one is a bit bigger, with a mass of 30% of Earth.
01:04The third one has 4% more mass than the previous.
01:08And the outermost is...
01:09No, it's not the biggest.
01:11Actually, it's just a baby.
01:13With a mass of 19% of Earth.
01:16All the planets are likely rocky, like the inner planets of our solar system.
01:20They orbit their star very closely.
01:23That's why they only need a few days, under a week, to make a full circle.
01:29Now, what about that star these little guys are circling?
01:33It's called Bernard Star.
01:35Astronomers have always had a hunch there might be at least one planet orbiting it.
01:39First off, this star is super close.
01:42In cosmic terms, of course.
01:44Only the Alpha Centauri trio is closer to us.
01:49Bernard Star is just under 6 light-years away, which is basically next door.
01:54At the same time, it's not like our Sun.
01:56Bernard Star is a red dwarf, the most common kind of star out there.
02:00It's got only about one-sixth the mass of the Sun.
02:04But red dwarfs are a goldmine for learning about planets outside our solar system.
02:09And studying Bernard Star can help scientists figure out what planets around single stars,
02:14like our Sun, or this red dwarf, are like.
02:18Or what kind of environments red dwarf planets might have.
02:22And most importantly, we might finally find the answer to this super important question.
02:27Could any of these places actually support life?
02:32For the longest time, scientists thought there might be a big Jupiter-like gas giant hanging out near Bernard Star.
02:39All because the star has a little wobble.
02:42It looks as if it shifts towards and away from Earth over time.
02:46So something might be tugging on it.
02:48Interestingly, it wasn't a giant planet doing the pulling.
02:51According to a study from March 2025, it's actually four smaller rocky planets.
02:58Each about four times the mass of Mercury.
03:02One day, they ganged up and started tugging on the star together.
03:06These planets are incredibly close to their star.
03:09So close that they can whip around it in just a few days.
03:14Sadly, because of that, they might be way too hot for anything like life.
03:18Besides, since these four seem to explain all the star's movement,
03:24the researchers think there's probably nothing else orbiting the habitable zone.
03:29So, there's no Earth 2.0 orbiting around Bernard's star.
03:34Still, it's an awesome find, especially since this star is basically our cosmic neighbor.
03:38Plus, the system might not stay off-limits forever.
03:43With nuclear fusion engines or light sails,
03:46futuristic propulsion systems that could make the trip way faster, way faster.
03:51We might probably go there one day.
03:54And then, we'll finally figure out if these worlds are really lifeless,
03:58and maybe even colonize them.
04:00Now, let's see how scientists found the star's hidden planets.
04:06Normally, astronomers spot exoplanets when they catch them crossing in front of their stars and blocking some light.
04:13But Bernard's star is tricky, because in our view, it's like we're looking from above the system,
04:18so its planets don't block the light in the usual way.
04:21That's why they call it the great white whale of planet hunting.
04:24To get around this, researchers used a super-sensitive instrument called Maroon X
04:31attached to the Gemini North Telescope on Hawaii's Mauna Kea Volcano.
04:37Over 112 nights spread out across three years,
04:40the telescope picked up tiny changes in the star's movement.
04:44These shifts let scientists figure out how many planets must be tugging on the star,
04:49as well as estimate their sizes.
04:52At first, they found three planets.
04:54But then they used another device, deliciously called ESPRESSO,
05:00and located at the Very Large Telescope in Chile.
05:04And only after a shot of this ESPRESSO did they find a fourth planet.
05:09By combining the data from both instruments,
05:11they were able to more or less confidently say their findings were solid,
05:15not just random glitches in the data.
05:17Even though red dwarfs like Bernard's star are the most common type of star in the universe,
05:24most are way too far for us to see planets around them easily.
05:29These new findings suggest that small rocky planets could be pretty common around these stars,
05:34and that's huge for future discoveries.
05:38Now, finding new exoplanets is cool and all,
05:41but it might be even more exciting to dwell on their birth and evolution.
05:46And a recent study has made the sweetest discovery ever.
05:49Newly-born exoplanets might actually look like Smarties,
05:53that popular British candy, rather than spheres.
05:55We've always kind of assumed that baby planets are born ball-shaped,
06:00but they might be oblate spheroids instead.
06:04A team of scientists from the University of Central Lancashire in England
06:08used computer simulations to build a model of the formation of planets
06:12in dense gas disks surrounding young stars.
06:17After that, they compared these models with actual observations
06:20and noticed that the young planets took pretty unusual shapes.
06:25The thing is that even though almost 6,000 exoplanets have been discovered so far,
06:32astronomers still don't have a clear understanding of the sequence of events
06:35marking their birth and early evolution.
06:38But this new research might finally shed light on this process.
06:42So, the astronomers examined the formation mechanisms of gas giant planets like Jupiter
06:48and came to the conclusion that planets built up from their centers.
06:52After that, the researchers focused on the initial shapes of such planets.
06:58They were also interested in how they could encourage the growth of these planetary seeds.
07:03How could they turn into such massive planets,
07:06some of them bigger than our solar system's largest giants?
07:09According to the standard theory of the formation of planets,
07:14such growth happens gradually and smoothly.
07:18First, dust particles start to stick together,
07:20turning into larger and larger objects.
07:23This process lasts for a very long time and is known as core accretion.
07:29It's the model of planet formation scientists favor.
07:31There's another theory, according to which planets' birth might happen over shorter periods of time.
07:39This data involves a protoplanetary disk,
07:42a disk of gas which makes up 99% of its mass,
07:46and dust, around 1%.
07:48This disk orbits a newly formed star,
07:52and hypothetically, planets might form from this cloud.
07:56Protoplanetary disks are likely to be common byproducts of star formation.
08:00They might range in mass from 0.001 to 0.3 solar masses.
08:07Inside such disks, matter slowly moves inward,
08:11and dust particles grow bigger to the size of pebbles.
08:15At one point, after 2 to 3 million years,
08:18a giant rotating protoplanetary disk breaks into pieces,
08:23and that's how baby planets are born.
08:25This theory is known as the disk instability model.
08:28As for the model built by the team,
08:32it seems to support this second, less favored theory,
08:35rapid planet formation through disk instability.
08:38All because this theory explains how large planets can form relatively quickly,
08:44at pretty large distances from their host stars.
08:48As for the weird flattened shape of these newly formed planets,
08:51it might be due to the material falling onto them.
08:55Most likely, it goes mainly to the poles of new planets.
08:58One of the main conclusions of the research is that the appearance of young exoplanets,
09:04as we see them from Earth, may vary depending on how they're angled.
09:09If Earth is directed face-on to an exoplanet,
09:12it will seem that the latter has a traditional spherical shape.
09:16But if seen on edge,
09:18a baby exoplanet will look like a real smarty.
09:21The team is going to continue to investigate the formation of planets
09:25with the help of an improved computer model.
09:28They believe they can find out the role the environment around a young planet plays
09:33in affecting its shape and formation.
09:35That's it for today.
09:38So hey, if you pacified your curiosity,
09:41then give the video a like and share it with your friends.
09:43Or if you want more,
09:44just click on these videos and stay on the bright side!