Planet found in nearest star system to Earth

I have always felt I was born either to late in time or to soon to enjoy the advancement of technology where we will be at in 200 years from now. That is of course we don't destroy ourselves first. Imagine letting the mind go for the minute and exploring space. Wow, What will we know in time. Going to explore planets finding life forms of all kinds, shapes, and sizes. I read once that the cock roach almost became the dominating species of the planet. They would of been 6 feet tall. They would live in mud like structures on top of each other. Or visit a planet of those that have been visiting us. Te things they could share with us. Opps I just got back to earth. Yeah I have missed the time.

"The majority of low-mass planets are found in such systems". Could this mean that our solar system was a double star system in the beginning? And could a planet exist in a goldilocks zone around either ACA or ACB or maybe both stars?

The only reason we are reading of large planets revolving around stars and generally in very tight orbits is because it is far easier to detect a large object, such as a Jupiter sized planet, than an Earth sized planet. Further, with both the eclipse and wobble methods of detecting companions, it is far easier to detect close in planets because the period of the wobble or transit is frequent enough to gauge.

They are only now just being able to detect Earth sized planets, and then those close to their primary causing very minute but frequent variations. A planet Earth's distance from its primary causes one wobble or one transit in a year of observation. To detect even a large planet like Jupiter at that planet's distance from the Sun, would take over five years to detect one wobble or one transit. And that's dependent upon whether the planetary systems are aligned in such a manner that we can observe either a transit or wobble.

All we are getting so far is a sampling of planets whose systems are aligned with ours, a less than 10% chance, and that the planets are large enough and close enough so that we can detect their influence upon their star.

To detect an Earth sized planet in an orbit around a rare G type star at the distance the earth is to the Sun, is probably yet years away from being achieved...and that's if we are very lucky.

I think that when the astronomical community is presented with findings like this we can only step back in wonder and congratulate the HARPS team for their outstanding work. To detect a wobble of 20 inches a second out at 4.5 light years is truly an example exquisite precision. As the writer of the article concluded "We live in exciting times"

Frank, you are misreading it. Proxima Centauri is closest to US but farthest from the 2 primary stars. What I want to know is, how long till it's not the closest to us in it's orbit?

I'm very curious as to why so many of these extrasolar planets have such short orbital periods and consequently have much higher orbital velocities. If Alpha Centauri B is approximately the same size as our Sun and this new planet is a little heavier than Earth and orbit at only 3.7 million miles then this planet must be traveling at an insane speed in its orbit. My calculations (3.7,000,000 X 3.14 divided by 3.2 days {77 hours}) show an orbital speed of roughly 150,800 mph. What would account for this and why is this so common for many of the extrasolars that have been discovered? I don't have a degree in orbital mechanics and math isn't my forte' so I'm open to any viable theories.

Alpha Centauri is the closest star system to our Sun.
If this article turns out to be true it means there is credence to the
theory that all stars have planets, plantesimals, comets, asteroids,
or other types of rotators. Of course some may still have clouds of gas that haven't coalesced yet.

In response to Frank Fielder, firstly hello fellow enthusiast. Great to hear others excited by this event. Your two points though need addressing

1) The article's references to Proxima Centauri as a 'faint. more distant component' of the Alpha Centauri System, actually is referring to its distance from the centre of the system itself, not its proximity to the Solar System.

Whereas the two giants of the system orbit each other in an elliptical orbit that, if it was in our solar system would be the difference in distance from the sun to a little beyond Saturn and then drifting out to a little beyond Uranus or about 1-2 Billion kilometres, Proxima Centauri is between 1-2 Trillion kilometres from the centre of the system, or about a fifth of a light year away from it. Its orbit is so far from the two primary stars that it is still uncertain if it is actually gravitationally.part of that system.

2) In respect of our solar system though, Proxima Centauri in its orbit, that seems to take hundreds of thousands if not millions of years to complete one circuit, is at this stage and for tens of thousands of years in a position that places it close to a tenth of a light year closer to us than the two primaries.

3) There is no question that Proxima Centauri could hold planets and probably does so. However Proxima Centauri is a red dwarf star, about M5, making it a star significantly smaller than the Sun or Alpha Centauri A and B. It is significantly less massive and dimmer and redder.

Whereas we get a whitish-yellow impression of our sun, the night sky of a planet revolving around Proxima would see its sun as a dimmer reddish colour. Further, because it is so much cooler, a planet revolving in its 'Goldilocks Zone' where all three forms of water can exists, would have an orbit much closer than Mercury is to our Sun.

This would cause two problems. Firstly the planet would probably be therefore gravitationally locked so only one side of the planet perpetually faces the star, like our moon does with Earth, and reduces the chance of a radiation shield around the planet. Secondly it means the planet is much closer to its star's variable outpourings of energy and Proxima is thought to be a 'flare star'. Such an outpouring from our Sun would have little serious impact on Earth. But a planet so close to its primary star would be saturated with radiation on a regular basis.

The interest in the two inner stars of the Alpha Centauri system is because unlike about 95% of the stars in the galaxy, these two stars are very close to being like our Sun and therefore likely to develop what we understand as life. Of course life elsewhere may be very different and able to cope with Proxima's excesses.

Proxima Centauri is still the Sun's nearest stellar neighbor. 'Faint, more distant' means, that it is in an orbit far from the two main components of the Alpha Centauri system. Pluto actually has five moons, and the discovery of a planet around one of the closest stars increases the chance, that there are planets around almost all stars in the Milky Way. Kepler can not find other planets in the Alpha Centauri system, because it is looking in a completely different direction. Although the distance to Alpha Centauri is only slightly more than four light-years, it is still very far to travel, and visits from ET is SF-fantasy.

Frank the faint and more distant is not relative to our solar system but to the other two stars, Alpha Centuri A and B and it is faint because it is red and dimmer not because it is further from us. I doubt if we can get to the Alpha Centuri system physically (heck, we have not yet gone to Mars and we have no colonies on the Moon). However, maybe they are getting our TV signals and watching the pre-election debates. Hey, maybe After that they don't want to have anything to do with us.