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Research shows that giant gas planets in other star systems often prevent the habitability of neighboring Earth-like planets by disrupting orbits and climates. An artist's rendering of an exoplanet system full of giant planets. Credit: NASA/Dana Berry

Chaos rules the cosmos: How giant gas planets threaten life on nearby Earth-like worlds

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Jupiter, the largest planet by far in our solar system, plays an important protective role. Its enormous gravitational field deflects comets and asteroids that might otherwise hit Earth, helping to create a stable environment for life to exist. But giant planets elsewhere in the universe don't necessarily protect life in their smaller, rocky neighbors.
The discovered planet (right), next to Proxima Centauri (red), the smaller planet and the dust ring | Illustration: Lorenzo Santinelli

A second planet has been discovered orbiting Proxima Centauri - the closest star to the Sun

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GJ 357 d orbits its sun. Image: Cornell University

A super-Earth was discovered in the habitable zone of a nearby solar system

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An artist's illustration of the planet Ross 128b. Credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser

Astronomers have discovered an Earth-sized planet 11 light years away

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The simulation aims to highlight the temperature differences that researchers hypothesize exist between the discovered planets. The inner two are too close and therefore would be too hot for liquid water, the middle three are in the sitting area where liquid water might be possible, while the outer two are too far away, and apparently, if there is water in them, they are frozen. Imaging: NASA/JPL-Caltech.

NASA's discovery of seven terrestrial planets in one system will spur a widespread hunt for similar systems

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A planet outside the solar system. Image: NASA/Ames/JPL-Caltech

Scientists are looking for signs of life in Wolf 1061c

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Pictured: Kepler Hall of Fame: Of the over a thousand confirmed planets discovered by the Kepler space telescope, eight are less than two Earth diameters in diameter and are in the habitable zone of their Sun. All eight orbit stars smaller and colder than the Sun. Image: NASA

Kepler discovered the thousandth planet

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A 'super-Earth' type planet orbits a red dwarf. Image: University of Hertfordshire

Almost every red dwarf may have a planet

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life in the universe Illustration: shutterstock

Earth will only be habitable for another 1.75 billion years

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Three suns in the sky as seen by the observer from one of the planets orbiting the star Gleise 667 in the Life Zone. (Credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser)

Three planets in the life zone of a nearby star

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A visualization of the planet "Kepler 62f", against the background of the sunrise of the mother star, "Kepler 62", the bright star to the right is the neighboring planet, 62e. Drawing: NASA

Swim on distant planets

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The six-planet model of Gliese 581

Astrobiology - Black plants and twilight zones / Bryn Nelson

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The habitable zone near red dwarfs is very small, it is better to look for Earth-like planets elsewhere

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Terrestrial planets may be common in the universe

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